Women's Suffrage - More Recent Than You Think

Being a history teacher, my head is filled with all kinds of useless knowledge.  A couple days ago, my fellow teachers and I were having a talk after school, when the subject of suffrage came up.  I mentioned that Switzerland was one of the last countries to grant women the vote and said that I thought it was 1976.  Samantha said it was 1971 and looked it up.  She was right and I was wrong.

Even though I already had this fuzzy fact in my head (picturing suffragettes as older ladies with large hats and ankle length dresses in our country), I knew Switzerland was late to the game.  After reading a little bit last night, I was even more surprised to uncover a few additional facts.

 

Two Swiss Anti-Suffrage Posters from the late 1950s

(left translation, "The mother works in politics! NO women's suffrage & voting)

(right translation, "Do you want those women? No women voting")

Although Switzerland held several national votes to grant women's suffrage, each was denied until 1971, but Switzerland is a confederation so each canton could grant suffrage and the first women voted at the local level in 1959.  At the time of the 1971 vote, the majority of cantons still denied votes to women.  Since that time, all but one had approved votes for women until 1990.  Appenzell Innerrhoden was the lone holdout, rejecting it in 1973, 1982, and 1990.  Following the 1990 vote, the Swiss Federal Supreme Court forced the canton to allow it, thereby making Switzerland the last country in Europe to allow full suffrage at all levels for women (the last to allow it nationally was tiny Lichtenstein in 1984).

So how could this small Swiss canton continue to reject votes for women despite overwhelming external pressure to adopt universal suffrage?  My guess is that it was the massive internal pressure to keep things the way they were.

Most of the worst case scenarios presented by the anti-sufferage movement had typically centered around the notion that if women were to get involved in politics, they would abandon domestic life or somehow reverse the social order and fall under the rule of domineering Amazonians.

Poor chap, he had it so good until his wife was able to cast a ballot!

Can't blame them, politics takes so much time, I'd abandon my children too!

Just like women, let them vote and then they want to put out fires!

Getting back to Appenzell Innerrhoden, the curious thing I discovered was that many Swiss cantons practice a rather unique forms of direct democracy – particularly so in Appenzell Innerrhoden, where they still hold something called Landsgemeinde, an open-air election assembly.  Each year on the last Sunday in April, all eligible voters gather in the village square for a cantonal assembly.

Landsgemeinde in Appenzell Innerrhoden

The Sunday morning begins with a church service followed by a parade at noontime to the village square.

Landsgemeinde Parade

Elected officials and members of the court wear their black robes and take their places on the platform in front of the assembly.  To gain admittance to the assembly, in the roped off center of the square, citizens must present their voters card (until 1991, when women first voted a family sword or bayonet was used as identification and men are still allowed to use this in place of a voting card).  After electing cantonal officials, anyone in the assembly is allowed to discuss any bill or make proposals and votes are conducted with a raising of the hand.

I think more than anything else, this public display of your voting was what kept women's suffrage from passing earlier.  With only men voting and looking around to see who would grant women the right to join them was probably too much pressure for some of these traditional men.

There may have also been a bit of the natural tendency for some of them to think about women who they didn't believe were thoughtful enough to vote.  I was surprised to learn, while listening to a radio show, that the early female British archaeologist and explorer, Gertrude Bell, was an anti-suffragist.  She believed that while she may have been intelligent enough to vote, the majority of her gender were not yet ready.  I must admit, sometimes I feel that way today, but about both genders.

Well, thanks for reading.  If you ask me, I believe that women in Switzerland would have gotten the vote far earlier if they had campaigned more like this:

A Brief History of Cheerleading

There were plenty of good comments the other day about Olympic annoyances, but Jules touched on another, cheerleaders, which I had overlooked in my post.

I first noticed Olympic cheerleaders at the 2008 Beijing games.  At the time, they seemed oddly out of place for a few reasons.  For starters, I thought the basic reason for cheerleaders was to work up the crowd, but are Olympic spectators so bored that they need entertaining to keep their spirits up?  Secondly, I thought the purpose for cheerleaders was to support a specific team, but these seemed to just be out there to dance around (the shift between cheering and dancing will be discussed later).  Finally, I guess if the purpose was just to be an attractive diversion, it seemed odd that the cheerleaders came out during the beach volleyball event where the contestants already were wearing skimpy outfits.

All of these questions led me to explore, just where did cheerleading come from in the first place?  It may surprise many to learn that the first cheerleaders were not women, but men, and it didn't originate in a warm weather location, but in frigid Minnesota.

Johnny Campbell

Although Princeton University is recognized as having the earliest crowd cheers, it wasn't until November 12, 1898, that a University of Minnesota student, Johnny Campbell, became the world's first recognized cheerleader when he directed the crowd during a game against Northwestern using the cheer, "Rah, Rah, Rah!  Ski-u-mah, Hoo-Rah!  Hoo-Rah!  Varsity!  Varsity!  Varsity, Minn-e-So-Tah!"  Other universities quickly caught on and by the next season, cheer squads had been formed at a number of schools.

The 1899 University of Kansas Cheer Squad

The primary purpose of these early cheer squads was to motivate the crowd and encourage the team particularly when enthusiasm began to wain.  Many of the earliest cheerleaders were selected primarily for their energy and loud voices.  Megaphones were their primary accessory and looks certainly weren't a consideration.

A 1909 Ohio State Cheerleader

Cheerleading remained largely male dominated in the earliest years as men typically had the loudest voices.

The 1913 University of Puget Sound Cheer Squad

As schools began to officially organize cheer squads, preppy outfits in school colors soon followed.  By the 1920s, women began joining cheer squads.  As their voices weren't generally as strong, but as they were usually lighter and more flexible, they became more often used in the jumps and stunts in increasingly mixed squads.

Throughout the 1930s and 40s, women began joining cheer squads in increasing numbers and of course during World War II many of the men were away in the military, so a gender shift naturally occurred in larger numbers.

The person most responsible for cheerleading as we know it today was Lawrence "Herkie" Herkimer, a cheerleader at Southern Methodist University, who formed the first cheerleaders association in 1948 (National Cheerleaders Association) and held the first cheerleading camp.  Herkie is also credited with creating a number of traditional cheerleading acrobatics and adding many elements we associate with traditional cheerleading today, including: patenting the pom pon (now often called the pom pom), the first uniform company, the spirit stick and of course the classic cheerleading jump – the Herkie.

Lawrence Herkimer doing his Herkie Jump

As more women became involved in gymnastics in the 1960s and 70s, ever increasing acrobatic maneuvers were introduced into cheerleading, but just as it was gaining recognition as an athletic endeavor, the Dallas Cowboys football team greatly increased the sexualization of cheer in 1972 by introducing its first all female squad with the smallest outfits ever.

The CowBelles & Beaux, Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders from the 1960s

1972 Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders

National television played a big role in popularizing the image of the Cowboys Cheerleaders and other teams soon copied their model.  As cheerleading became seen as an exclusively female role and as the outfits became increasingly more revealing, men mostly dropped out of cheerleading.

Which brings us to where we are today.  I see cheerleading going two directions.  There is a 1950s and 60s version of cheerleading which is what most of our high schools perform.  This is an increasingly athletic and acrobatic sport.  Then there is a more recent dance type of cheerleading where it is usually very little cheering and it's primarily a group of women dressed in revealing outfits dancing for the crowd.

Our local university, Cal Poly, has two cheerleading squads, neither of which they call cheerleaders.  One is the Cal Poly Stunt Team (these are the ones in skirts and bows in their hair) and the other is the Cal Poly Dance Team.  Both perform at the same events.  You can see the difference in this video where they're performing at the same time:

I don't go to many sports events, but when I do if I'm unlucky enough to be seated closer to the play and cheerleaders or dancers suddenly come out and start performing right in front of me, it certainly makes me uncomfortable.  I know they've put a lot of hard work into their routines, so I don't want to be rude and ignore them, but I really don't want to watch a bunch of people I don't know in tiny outfits dancing right in front of me either.

Which brings me back to the Olympics.  I watch the Olympics for the sport, so it seems strange to see more events gaining cheerleaders.  One of my questions is if beach volleyball wants to be taken seriously, do they really think it's so dull that they need to liven things up with a bunch of cheerleader performances.  Another thing I wonder about is how do they pick the sports to add cheerleading to?  Here in America it started with Football in which the play stops so often that it really could use something to keep the crowd rooting, but why not ping pong (heck, I'll bet you have a hard time even seeing what's going on if you're watching from the actual stadium).

So what's my solution?  Make cheerleading a real Olympic sport with real rules.  That way, they won't feel like they need to include it at the sidelines of other sports.  And while they're at it, why not bring back Tug-of-War?  It would be really neat to see what country produces the strongest squad.

Oh, and one last thing about that image problem with cheerleading.  Perhaps you may not know this but we've already had one go on and become President of the United States...

George W. Bush was the head cheerleader during his high school days at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts.

George Wellington "Cap" Streeter - A Chicago Legend

If you visit Chicago today, the most exclusive and luxurious part of the city lying right on Lake Michigan (including the Magnificent Mile to Lake Shore Drive, the Gold Coast, Navy Pier, Oprah's apartment, John Hancock Center, etc.), the area with all the upscale shops and businesses is known as Streeterville.  It may surprise some then that Streeterville's founder and namesake was an eccentric drifter, showman, aspiring gun runner, squatter and land baron.

Capt. George W. Streeter

George Wellington Streeter was born on a farm near Flint, Michigan in 1837.  As a youth, he held various jobs around the Great Lakes as a miner, lumberjack, fur trapper, ice cutter, and sailor on vessels in Georgian Bay off of Lake Huron.  He married his first wife, Minnie Waters, and then traveled West as a pioneer in a covered wagon, but returned to Michigan just before the Civil War.  During that conflict, he served as a Private in Company C, 15th Michigan Infantry, and among others saw action at the battles of Nashville and Missionary Ridge.  After the war, he formed a traveling circus with a large collection of animals, marionettes, and a Hindu Mystery Professor.  When the circus became stranded in Indianapolis in 1867, he sold it for $5,000.  His wife left and joined a traveling vaudeville troupe, so he married secondly, Lavina Walters, and George decided to take up a completely different profession.  With the profit from the circus sale, he entered the steamboat business and ran vessels on the Mississippi, Ohio, and Tennessee Rivers.  He built a new boat and married a third time, Maria Mulholland.  The two settled in South Chicago in 1883 and George got to work building a new boat, the Reutan, on the Calumet River.

Captain Streeter Repairing the Reutan

Once completed, there was rumor that the couple was planning on running guns to Honduras, but before taking the ship to Central America, but like so much in Streeter's life, I could not ascertain if there was truth in this story.  On July 10, 1886, George was moving the Reutan from the Calumet onto Lake Michigan when a storm arose and he ran the ship aground on a sandy rise about 450 feet off the Chicago shore.  The ship was so battered, that Streeter left the vessel in place as he tried to repair it.  Due to the silting action of the waves, his boat was soon surrounded by sand and Streeter built a landing to allow him to travel to and from Chicago.  Checking his navigation charts, Streeter stumbled upon his unique situation.  His vessel was stranded outside the city and state boundaries, so he laid claim the land by the right of discovery and also by laws allowing Civil War veterans to homestead on heretofore unclaimed land.  He declared his domain the United States District of Lake Michigan.

Map Showing Changing Chicago Shoreline over Time

Ever the entrepreneur and eager to expand his claim, Streeter was always looking for ways to make money.  The city was finally rebuilding after the Great Chicago Fire and construction was booming.  Contractors were looking for places to dump debris and for a sum Streeter allowed them to pile it up around his stranded vessel on the sand bar.  Before long, the backfill and rubble had grown to a whopping 186 acres and stretched all the way to the Chicago shore (angering the wealthy land owners who had previously owned shoreline property).

Captain Streeter with Lake Michigan District Residents

Dressed smartly in a top hat and coat, Streeter then rented or sold deeds to poor homesteaders from an office he rented in Chicago's Tremont Hotel.  Soon the area was populated with hobos, fellow squatters, and prostitutes.  Several property owners (among them the industrialist N. K. Fairbank) sued Streeter over riparian water rights and won in Illinois State courts, but Streeter holding that he lay outside their jurisdiction refused to vacate his District.  Their claim was that Streeter was squatting on his property, but Streeter noted, ""When I come here ther warn't a particle of land for me to squat on!"

The District of Lake Michigan (aka Streeterville)

Correctly believing that Fairbank would attempt to remove his boat, Streeter had previously exchanged his previous houseboat for a two story converted dwelling near where his boat had grounded.  The living quarters were on the second story and the ground floor became a kind of war room.  It even contained a ladder that could be raised.

Captain Streeter's Converted Boat Fortress/Home

In July 1888, five policemen came with an eviction notice, but were driven off by his sawed off musket filled with bird shot.  The next month, several more successfully caught Streeter until his wife threw boiling water on the men allowing George to grab his gun and again chase them off.  At one point, an army of 500 officers were even repulsed by an even larger contingent of hobos defending their landlord whom they called "Captain."  Over the years, Streeter seemed to best the law every time.

Cap and Ma Streeter Leaving Court

For his defensive activities, he was acquitted for various reasons.  Sometimes his actions were deemed self-defense, once it was found that the bird shot he fired was not lethal, still another time Streeter claimed that a party of one (himself) could not be held liable for not dispersing as that would require more than one person.

Captain Streeter During One of His Numerous Stints in the Pokey

During the Columbian Exposition, Captain Streeter refloated the Reutan and ferried passengers between Streeterville and the fair and things were looking good for a time.  However in 1902, Streeter's luck appeared to run out.  He was convicted of the murder of John Kirk, a hired gunman sent after Streeter and was sentenced to life in prison.  Streeter claimed he had been framed.  While in jail, his wife Maria died, but nine months after his conviction, Governor Yates sided with Streeter and pardoned him.  Streeter married a fourth time, to Elma "Ma" Lockwood, as fiery a lady as his former wife and they resumed control of his District.  Lawsuit after lawsuit came, but Streeter was able to hire legal assistance by offering deeds to property in his District.

Captain and Ma Streeter During One of their Many Court Appearances

Streeterville had become a nuisance to the growing city and the leaders eventually tired of this lawless area front and center.  In 1918, Streeter was arrested for selling liquor on Sundays.  During this raid, men hired by the Chicago Title and Trust Company burned his home to the ground.  "Ma" Streeter charged the group with a meat cleaver, but they were forced to retreat.  Streeter was indignant stating, "This here is an outrage!  It's worse than the Kaiser ever did."

Ma and Cap Streeter

Final Streeterville Home of Capt. Geo. Streeter

Inside the Home

Now off their land, the Streeters were again living on a boat and with Captain removed, clearing and development began in earnest in Streeterville.  Streeter continued his lawsuits until his death in 1921, even introducing forged documents from President Grover Cleveland.  Now a bit of a Chicago legend, his funeral was attended by a number of dignitaries including Mayor Thompson.

Funeral of Captain Streeter

In 1924, "Ma" Streeter filed a claim of one billion in damages against the new property owners, but the next year her claim was dismissed by federal courts that ruled that since George's first wife had abandoned him, but not divorced his subsequent marriages were invalid.  Streeter descendants continued to file claims until 1940 when the last claim was dismissed.

Ketchup Bottle: Function Over Form

At some point, most of us have had to deal with ketchup that doesn't come easily out of the bottle.  Some people pound the bottom, others stick a knife up the neck and loosen it up to allow it to flow.

If you've experienced this frustration, you may have wondered why someone designed neck of the bottle that way.

Long ago, ketchup had a runny consistency and manufacturers designed their narrow-necked bottles to try and slow the flow.  Consumers however, preferred thicker ketchups and while the product inside changed, the recognizable bottle shape remained the same.

Heinz Ketchup Bottles from 1880 to 1910

Pricey Photo

With graduation so near, one of my students yesterday was asking about various career possibilities when she brought up the idea of photography.  I gave her some general pointers about how to develop a career plan, but also informed her that due to the weak economy and the increasing availability of good cameras and editing equipment, the photography market is somewhat down in our area.  She then asked, what about selling photographs, "what's the most a photograph has ever sold for?"

That I did not know, so I looked it up and was surprised by the answer I found.  The most expensive photograph ever sold at auction was one titled Rhein II by Andreas Gursky.  Not only was I surprised by how much the photograph fetched, but I was surprised by how bland the image was.

Rhein II by Andreas Gursky

Obviously it is a photo of the Rhine River in Germany, but there are a few more surprising things about the picture.  Gursky photoshopped it to remove the industrial skyline from the background and a dog walker in the foreground.

So, what was the selling price of this photograph?  On November 8, 2011, it sold for $4,300,000!

Not only that, but I was surprised to see that six of the top eight priciest photographs sold since the recession began.  You can see the Wikipedia list HERE.

Eyeglass Part Trivia

A funny thing happened today in class.  While I was teaching a student exclaimed, "Oh no, I've broken my... my... Hey, Mr. Maas, what's this part on eyeglasses called?"  He was pointing to the long part that goes above the ears and comes off the frame around the lens.

So I looked it up.  It's called a "temple."  Makes sense I suppose.  And now you know too.

President Taft Miscellanea

Today I want to revisit a little trivia about President Taft.  He was of course the Person-of-Mystery last March 31.

Taft is one of our lesser known presidents, but if people remember him for anything, it's his weight.  It is said that he was about 332 pounds when he was in office.

President Taft in 1908

Taft in profile on the links after leaving the executive office

Even his bathing was the source of jokes as it was rumored that he had become stuck in a bath and needed the help of several assistants to be removed.  This was not helped by the fact that he had an oversized (about 7 ft by 3 1/2 ft) custom built tub installed at the White House.  One newspaper at the time described it as having "pond-like dimensions."

Workers relaxing in Taft's custom tub before leaving the factory

I don't believe that Taft would have won even a single term in the modern age.  His weight would have become the fodder of comedians who would have had a field day with his campaign slogan, "Get on the Raft with Taft."

A musical rendition of his campaign slogan

I'm also certain the press would have produced this Dukakis-like photo of Taft on a water buffalo during his time as Governor of the Philippines.

Taft it is said to have disliked the presidency.  While being groomed for the office, then President Teddy Roosevelt was privately joking late one evening with Secretary and Mrs. Taft.  Speaking like a fortune-teller, Roosevelt said, "I see a man standing before me weighing about 350 pounds.  There is something hanging over his head. I cannot make out what it is. At one time it looks like the presidency—then again it looks like the chief justiceship."  Mrs. Taft blurted out, "Make it the presidency!"  Secretary Taft somewhat less enthusiastically replied, "Make it the chief justice-ship."  Taft would later win the presidency, but after a single term, he also ignominiously became the only sitting president to finish third in a presidential election behind the other major party and the more successful third-party candidate in the election of 1912.

He is remembered for being the first president to throw out the opening pitch at a baseball game and many believe he was responsible for starting the seventh inning stretch.  After he left office he lost 150 pounds and was eventually appointed to the Supreme Court and later became Chief Justice, a position he found much more to his liking (thus making him the only person ever to be President and Chief Justice) .  All-in-all he seems a like a pretty decent fellow to me, he enjoyed his food, and had a grand sense of humor.

Of his laugh, Taft biographer Henry Pringle wrote, "It was by all odds the most infectious chuckle in the history of politics. It started with a silent trembling of Taft's ample stomach. The next sign was a pause in the reading of his speech, and the spread of a slow grin across his face. Then came a kind of gulp which seemed to escape without his being aware that the climax was near. Laughter followed hard on the chuckle itself, and the audience invariable joined in."

A much leaner Chief Justice Taft