The Literary Digest – Page 26 – Old Magazine Articles

The German Threat to Russia
(Literary Digest, 1913)

The German military maneuvers have aroused the attention of Europe to the splendid equipment and administration of the Army, not only in the fighting spirit, but in the commissariat and its medical service.

-so begins the attached article which referenced the overall sense of intimidation and uneasiness that was triggered by the display of bristling military might that was recently witnessed. The journalist mused about just what the Franco-Russian Alliance would mean in the face of such an advanced military force, touching upon the size of the German Army compared with other forces in Europe -openly stating that France could never stand up to an attack.

Waiting for Television
(Literary Digest, 1937)

Written in response to the loud cries generated by those would-be pioneering couch-potatoes, this article presents a lengthy list of all the technical difficulties the young television broadcasting industry had to deal with in 1937.

First to have commercial television, it is agreed, will be New York City, then Philadelphia. In both of these cities transmitting-stations already exist. Advancement to other urban centers will be slower. Chicago, for example will have commercial television only after it has been made to pay in New York and Philadelphia. As each city’s television enterprises become self-supporting, installation will be begun in a new center.

The Japanese Drive on Beijing
(The Literary Digest, 1933)

The aggressive ambitions of Japan know no bounds. The occupation of Peiping [Beijing] will lead to further aggression in Shantung and Shansi and other northern provinces, and will result either in the establishment of a new puppet regime in North China.

The Shanghai SHUN PAO, an independent newspaper, bewails the futility of the uncoordinated resistance which has prevailed among China’s forces since the capture of Jehol, and it adds:

The only possibilities now are peace by compromise or a continuance of war. Despite the dangers of the latter course it is the only possible solution, but resistance must be coordinated under an able leader, China must fight or become a second Korea.

BBC Television Broadcasting Begins
(Literary Digest, 1935)

The British Broadcasting Corporation announced that they were capable of transmitting television programming as early as 1935:

The British engineers plan to begin with a single broadcasting tower, capable of transmitting television images to receiving sets within a radius of about thirty miles…British engineers are not the first to try television broadcasting. A station has been operating regularly in Berlin for several months.

The British View of Religious America
(Literary Digest, 1913)

…Christianity in America is divided into two camps. The one is orthodox. It’s orthodoxy is apt to degenerate into the senile attachment to the letter of Scripture…There is a lack of mental breadth, of intellectual enlightenment, about the members of this school which is a little disheartening to one who is in agreement with them on the central matters…The other school seems to have sacrificed almost everything which makes Christianity distinct from a temporary philosophy. It’s members have the bad habit of preaching eugenics or sociology in place of the Gospel. They appear to be afraid of the great epistles and the nobler passages of the Gospels, and are apt to speak in terms which would suggest that there was nothing distinctive in Christianity which can make it an absolute and universal faith.

‘Down-With Suffrage!”
(Literary Digest, 1908)

The great meeting held recently in London to launch the Women’s National Anti-suffrage League was made additionally noteworthy by the participation of Mrs. Humphry Ward…

The real reason why women ought not to have the political franchise is the very simple reason that they are not men, and that according to a well-known dictum, even an act of Parliament can not make them men. Men govern the world, and, so far as it is possible to foresee, they must always govern it.

Beethoven and his Deafness
(The Literary Digest, 1894)

Musical historian W.S.B. Mathews considers the three musical styles of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 – 1827) and entirely dismisses the possibility that his deafness in later years effected his compositions not one jot.

Belva Ann Lockwood: Pioneer Sufragette
(The Literary Digest
(1917)

Attached herein is the obituary of a remarkable woman and early feminist: Belva Lockwood (1830 – 1917) was the first woman lawyer to argue a case before the United States Supreme Court. A graduate of Genesee College, she was the nominee from the Equal Rights Party of the Pacific to run for President during the 1884 U.S. election.

Britain Buries Her Own
(Literary Digest, 1919)

Aside from scanning and posting vast numbers of historic magazine articles, the only other activity that has heightened our sense of inner tranquility has been our various walks through British and Commonwealth World War I graveyards. They are truly unique and beautiful gardens that can be appreciated on a number of different levels and it was not surprising to learn that many of the finest aesthetic minds in Britain had a hand in their creation.

This article, printed six months after the last shot was fired, is about the Imperial War Graves Commission (now called The Commonwealth War Graves Commission) and their plans as to how the dead of the British Empire were to be interred.

Click here to read about a 1920 visit the grave of poet Rupert Brooke.

Zeppelin Shot Down
(Literary Digest, 1919)

Pictured in the attached PDF file is a seldom-seen black and white photograph depicting the deflated remains of an unidentified W.W. I German zeppelin as it rested on the tree tops of a French forest after having been forced from the skies.

The 1922 U.S. Elections: Some Wins But Mostly Defeats
(The Literary Digest, 1922)

As 1922 came to a close, it seemed that some of the Suffragettes of the old-school had not lost their taste for violence, as the reader will discover in the opening paragraph of this one page article that primarily focused on the defeat of all but one of the women candidates who ran for Federal offices in the 1922 elections. Thirty-three women running for Congressional and legislative seats in New York State went down to defeat and there were no women elected or re-elected from any state for Congress that year. However, the state of Ohio elected it’s first woman to that state’s Supreme Court: Florence E. Allen (1884–1965).

Gaudier-Brzeska
(Literary Digest, 1916)

Henri Gaudier-Brzeska (1891 – 1915) was an avant-garde sculptor of the Vorticist school. Prior to the war he resided in London and broke bread with the talented Bohemians of that burg, and this article is composed of snippets of text from a remembrance written by his close friend, Ezra Pound.

Clemenceau and the Treaty Violations
(The Literary Digest, 1922)

Georges Clemenceau (1841-1929) served as one of France’s wartime Premieres (1917-1920). The following is an excerpt from his letter to the American people imploring them to share in his outrage concerning Germany’s open contempt for their obligations agreed to under the Versailles Treaty. Clemenceau would die seven years later, fully convinced that another devastating war with Germany was just around the corner.

Click here if you would like to read about the 1936 Versailles Treaty violations.

Japan’s China Poicy
(Literary Digest, 1935)

What was called a Japanese ‘Monroe Doctrine for Asia’ whereby Japan would wield dominance there, especially in Chinese affairs, was announced last April, and drew the immediate attention of the world’s press.

In the last days of this January a following-up of this intention was seen in a series of talks at Nanking between Chiang Kai-shek, President and Generalissimo of the Nationalist Government of China, and Lieutenant-General Soshiyuki Suzuki, Japanese military representative at Shanghai; and among Akira Ariyoshi, Japanese Minister to China, and General Chiang and Premiere Wang Ching-wei.

Jerome K. Jerome on Books
(Literary Digest, 1906)

Jerome K. Jerome (1859 – 1927) was a British author and playwright from one of the sillier tribes who is best remembered for his humorous travelogue Three Men in a Boat (1889). In the attached interview, the humorist laments that the novels in his day (as opposed to our own) so seldom inspire any real use of the mind:

Books have become the modern narcotic. China has adopted the opium habit for want of fiction. When China obtains each week her ‘Greatest Novel Of The Century’, her ‘Most Thrilling Story Of The Year’, her ‘Best Selling Book Of The Season’ the opium den will be no more needed.

From Amazon: Three Men in a Boat

Military Buildup in the USSR
(Literary Digest, 1935)

Premier Vyacheslav M. Molotov (1890 – 1986) pictured the Soviet Union as a lusty young giant strong enough to defend itself from both the East and the West in the keynote speech of the Seventh All Union Congress of Soviets, the Soviet Parliament.

In proof of this claim it was shown that in the last two years the Soviet Government had increased the strength of the Red Army from 562,000 men in 1932 to 940,000 in 1934.

Read about all the various international treaties that the Soviet Union violated…

A Census of Skyscrapers
(Literary Digest, 1929)

Egged on by the 1929 completion of the Chrysler building, the curious souls who ran the New York offices of THE LITERARY DIGEST were moved to learn more about skyscrapers, both in New York as well as other parts of the U.S. and We were surprised to learn that as of 1929

50 percent of the buildings in New York from 10 to 20 stories and 60 percent of those over 20 stories are located between 14th and 59th streets.

This article also presents statistical data concerning the number of tall buildings that could be found throughout the 1920s United States.

An Interview with Suzanne Lenglen
(Literary Digest, 1921)

A magazine interview highlighting the tennis career of Suzanne Lenglen (1899 – 1938) up to the summer of 1921.

Mille. Lenglen was a remarkable French tennis player who won 31 Grand Slam titles from 1914 through 1926. She is remembered as the the first high-profile European woman tennis star to go professional: in 1912 she was paid $50,000.00 to play a series of matches against Mary K. Browne (1891 – 1971). This article concentrates on her supreme confidence and overwhelming determination to win.

When prest as to whether she liked a tonic, or say just a
little wine, before her matches, Mile. Lenglen admitted that she
did and that she had been promised that it would be obtained
for her in the United States. Despite the fact that she is in an
arid land Suzanne praised the effect of this stimulant on her
game.

‘Nothing, she said, is so fine for the nerve, for the strength
for the morale. A little wine tones up the system just right.
One can not always be serious. There must be some sparkle, too.’