Articles from 1915
This cartoon pokes fun at the high cost of being charitable. Throughout much of World War One there was always the problem of what to do with the growing number of refugees and orphans -and the answer was never cheap. This drawing reveals a different Rea Irvin, but the drawing style for which he would be remembered is clearly emerging.
A two column item on anti-Semitism
In the calamity of war we act now as if we were one heart and one soul with the Jews. However, and I am pained to say it, I must declare that the Jewish question remains and will perhaps, just because of the war, become still more acute. The Jews are a foreign people and are our opponents in France, Russia and England, together with the enormous means at their disposal.
Click here to read an article about the Warsaw Ghetto.
One of Conde Nast’s most popular magazines reviewed D.W. Griffith’s film, The Birth of a Nation and gave a somewhat balanced account of the production. The journalist clearly recognized that the movie was unfair to the Negro yet remarkable for it’s photography.
This 1915 article goes into great length listing the names of all the assorted European noblemen and plutocrats who fell during the first year and a half of the First World War.
The great world conflict which broke out soon after [the murder of Archduke Ferdinand] has placed the pall of mourning over every third home in the belligerent countries of Europe… The dreadful slaughter has fallen with especial heaviness on the upper and wealthy classes…
The writer, Charles Stolberg, also included the names of the most admired European athletes who gave their lives for king and country.
With the publishing of the first part of his autobiography, Reveries Over Childhood and Youth, W.B. Yeats (1865 – 1939) got some attention in the American press. This small column first appeared in VANITY FAIR magazine praising his ability as a genuine artist.
In 1915, some newspaper readers might have preferred to interpret the passage of the Smith-Burnett Immigration bill as a legal measure that would insure a higher standard for immigrants to meet in order to guarantee citizenship; while others tended to interpret the legislation as a restrictive law that was intended only to exclude from citizenship Italians and Eastern-European Jews. This article reported on a massive New York protest decrying the Smith-Burnett bill that was attended by Louis D. Brandeis (1856 – 1941; appointed to the Supreme Court a year later), Episcopal Bishop David Hummel Greer (1844 – 1919) and former president of Columbia University Seth Low (1850 – 1916).
Green Card holders are to this day still required to show fluency in the English language, although the swearing-in ceremony and their voting ballots are often in their native language. Go figure.
In this article Vladimir Lenin speaks of his fondness for The New York Times.
A look back at men’s jackets, both for the garden party as well as other antiquated leisure activities.
This very brief column appeared in Vanity Fair Magazine during the winter of 1915 as one element in the publicity campaign supporting the distribution of The Death of Nobody, Jules Romains’ (1885 – 1972) 1911 novel.
Prior to the First World War Romains was primarily known as a poet and founder (along with fellow poet Georges Chennevière) of Unanimisme, a movement that combined concept of international brotherhood with the psychological ideal involving a shared group consciousness. At the time of this printing, the novelist was serving in the French Army.
A short, uncredited article written in response to a report by Booker T. Washington (1856-1915) concerning a series of lynchings in 1914. There is a minute breakdown, by state, showing where each of the murders took place.
A two page profile of the fifty seven year-old opera composer, Giacomo Puccini (1858 – 1924). Published at a time when his most popular work was behind him, the article centers on the composer’s career; from Puccini’s first opera, La Ville (1884) to his most recent, The Little Wooden Shoes.
