I am preparing my list for this year’s Dog Days of Summer, and in going through last year’s posts, I thought this one bears repeating… We all associate Dalmatians with firehouses. (And if you’d like to receive the dog stories by email, check off “American Dogs” in the box on the right. The series starts in July.) Here’s why:

The Dalmatian is described as a strong, active dog capable of great endurance and considerable speed.  When we look back at their history it is clear that they have been well-suited for many jobs for which they were used, including as a firehouse dog.

These handsome, short-haired dogs have always been working dogs.  They have served as sentinels along the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea, protecting the borders of Dalmatia and Croatia; they have been used as shepherds and hunting dogs, and their strength has permitted them to be used pulling wagons or carts.

Their use with horses goes back to the early days of coach travel in Europe.  It is said that the aristocrats who rode in coaches during the 18^th century had seen the regal black-and-white dogs and thought they were a good addition to their retinue.

As a breed, the Dalmatian soon demonstrated an affinity for being with horses.  They were happy running alongside them, or bedding down in the horse stalls at night–horse and dog seemed well-suited to each other.

Coach drivers came to appreciate the dogs for their protective qualities.  If a coach driver wanted a good night’s sleep without worrying about theft of his horses, he could leave a Dalmatian on guard in the stable.

Firefighting

People have fought fires since the beginning of time.  In America, the first organized companies started with all-volunteer groups as early 1678.  While many fires still had to be fought with bucket brigades, men began to devise hand pumps for powering the water spray.  As pumps became bigger and better, the companies used wagons to transport the pumpers.  Early on, few companies could afford horses so the men pulled the wagons themselves, but as some city companies began to gain more funding, they could afford horses to pull the fire apparatus.  With this development, the dogs became useful.

At the sound of the alarm, a good Dalmatian would rouse the horses and then emerge from the firehouse, barking to clear the way.  Once en route, the Dalmatian encouraged a fast pace by running alongside the team of horses.

The Dog’s Job Continues

When the wagon arrived at the fire, the fire fighters unfastened the horses and moved them away from the fire so that no stray sparks could land on these animals.  During the winters, the horses were usually covered with blankets for warmth and fire protection; in summer blankets were still thrown over them to protect them from stray sparks. At that point, the Dalmatian assumed a new role: keeping the horses calm and keeping them together until it was time to go back to the firehouse.

Breed experts object to a rumor that people sometimes repeat–that Dalmatians are deaf and therefore the siren doesn’t bother them. While the breed has a slightly higher incidence of deafness than other breeds, that is not what made them well-qualified for working at a firehouse.
Today a few firehouses still keep a Dalmatian as a mascot. Many more have firefighters who wiill bring their dogs in for use in parades.

One has to agree that a Dalmatian on a fire truck is a wonderful sight to see.

A turning point for women inventors came when women’s rights activists began to advocate for inclusion of a showcase for women within the exposition the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition.  A Centennial Women’s Executive Committee was established and a separate Women’s Pavilion was erected; women inventors with patents or pending patents were able to display their inventions.  That year more than 75 women exhibited their inventions ranging from emergency flares, model interlocking bricks, a life-preserving mattress for steam-boats, and a tool for pulverizing rocks; these were shown alongside the more traditional fare of needlework, corsets, and household items.

This month’s American Snapshots e-letter features Mothers of Invention featuring three exceptional women inventors.  You may visit the e-letter page directly or sign up for e-letter so you don’t miss future mailings: kate@americacomesalive.com

In addition, however, America Comes Alive has already featured several other important women inventors. Elsewhere on the website read about:

• Josephine Cochran who invented the dishwasher in 1886;
• Mary Anderson who invented the windshield wiper when she made a visit to NYC; the device became a standard item on cars after 1915.
• Mary Phelps Jacob who invented the brassiere in 1913, replacing the far less comfortable corsets stiffened with whale bone.
• Sarah Goode who invented an early form of a Murphy bed.   This one could fold up to be a desk during the day. (On July 14, 1885, Sarah E. Goode, became the first African-American woman to be granted a patent by the U.S. Patent And Trademark Office.)

If you know of other women inventors,  write me and I’ll track them down.

The topic of the evening was “Movie Star Homes,” a subject on which Mike has written two books: Movie Star Homes: From the Famous to the Forgotten with co-author Judy Artunian and More Hollywood Homes.  He began his remarks by explaining that his obsession began as a hobby ten years ago when he started collecting vintage postcards of movie star homes.  The postcards featured watercolor drawings of the home and identified the star and the neighborhood (Brentwood, Beverly Hills, Santa Monica), but some actually printed the star’s full address—something that would certainly give today’s stars pause.

As his collection grew, Mike became curious about which of the houses still existed and how they looked today when compared with the depictions on the postcards.  The ones with full addresses were easy to find; others led to superior sleuthing on Mike’s part. He spent a lot of time going through city directories at various libraries in search of exact addresses.  After searching through enough years, he usually found an address but when he didn’t, he still visited the area in search of landmarks that would identify where a star’s house had been (or if he was lucky, still was).

My favorite example of Mike’s hunt came at the end of the program when he described how he identified the location of the home of a silent film star named Bessie Love (1898-1986).  The vintage photo he had of Bessie showed her in an automobile that would have dated to a little earlier than 1920; the photo identified the street where she lived but gave no house number.  The only identifiable landmark in the picture was a small building (not Bessie’s house) in the background.  Mike followed all the leads he had including the city directories for the appropriate years, but he found nothing.  He still went to the street and photographed up and down it, hoping for some recognizable sign.  Not until he got home and re-examined his photos, did he pick out the fact that the squat little building in the picture that stood behind Bessie’s car could be matched to a small building in one of his current pictures.  From this, he was able to definitively conclude where her house had stood and what had been built to replace it.

Mike Oldham concluded the program with an inclusive invitation. He noted that there are still many more homes to identify and suggested others could join his pursuit.  But honestly, I think the real take-away from the evening is “pursue what you love.”  Your spirit will be the richer for it.

In the meantime, if you can get to L.A., these books make great guidebooks for the homes of the stars.  If not, you can read them and enjoy the sites via Oldham’s pictures.

Achieved freedom in 1855

 Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley was born into slavery in North Carolina. Her mother was a seamstress, and Elizabeth was originally told that her father was George Hobbs, a slave who lived on a plantation one hundred miles away.  For the first eight years of Elizabeth’s life, Hobbs visited his wife and child at Christmas and Easter. Then Hobbs’ owner moved away, and George was never seen again by his family.

As Elizabeth’s mother was dying, she revealed to Elizabeth that though her husband was George Hobbs, Elizabeth’s true father was the owner of the plantation where they lived.

Keckley was only age 4 or 5 when she took on nursemaid duties for the plantation family.  There were four white children under the age of ten, so it was decided that Elizabeth would look after the most recently born infant daughter.

When she was in her teens, Keckley was sent to another household to work for the son of the plantation owner, and she became a target of abuse by the village schoolmaster who would summon her for beatings. Later she was sold and sent to St. Louis where she was raped.  She gave birth to her only son, George, named after her own presumed father.

Looking for a Way Out of Slavery

Keckley approached her owner, a Mr. Garland, and asked that the give her a dollar amount for which she could buy freedom for herself and her son.  At first Garland refused to give an amount and then after several requests he stipulated $1200.   Keckley’s income as a seamstress primarily went to support the Garland family who had hit upon rough times, so she found it impossible to save money.  She made plans to go North to look for financial help for buying her freedom, but before she left, one of her customers came forward and put up about $400 of her own money and got friends to put up the rest. Keckley and her son were free.

Keckley wanted her son to have an education, so when he was old enough she enrolled him in Wilberforce University (founded in 1856 in Ohio near one of the stops of the Underground Railroad.)

When the war started, George Jr. wanted to fight for the Union. Because his father was white, he looked white enough to enroll in the Union Army.  (African-Americans could not enlist until 1863.)  Sadly for Elizabeth, her son was killed in August of 1861 at the battle of Wilson’s Creek in Missouri.

Keckley continued to run her St. Louis-based business, and then decided to move on.  First she tried to settle in Maryland but laws were tightening on former slaves, so she moved to Washington D.C. in 1860 where she acquired an excellent reputation among the society women, including Varnia Davis (wife of Jefferson Davis) and Mary Anne Randolph Custis Lee (wife of Robert E. Lee).  She was recommended to Mary Todd Lincoln and was soon the First Lady’s favorite seamstress.  (One of Keckley’s dresses is in the Smithsonian as Mary wore it for the second inauguration, and any photos of Mary Lincoln by Matthew Brady were very likely taken in Keckley dresses.)

Elizabeth Keckley became one of the few people who could calm Mary when she was upset, so Keckley not only made Mary’s dresses but she was at the White House each morning to help Mary get dressed.  As a result, she had an unusual view of the White House and its inhabitants.

Helping Others

In Washington in 1862, Keckley came up with the idea of forming the Contraband (former slave) Relief Association.  She noted that white people in DC were raising funds for relief of the soldiers, and so Keckley suggested that the “colored people” form a group to raise money for their own unfortunate. The group raised money and gathered food and clothing; they sponsored Christmas dinners for the sick and wounded from the war; and they helped find teachers for the schools for the newly freed.  In 1864 the organization changed its name to the Ladies’ Freedmen and Soldiers’ Relief Association.  While the organization eventually disbanded, they set a standard and exposed the very real needs of the displaced black community.

After the assassination, Mary Lincoln eventually decided to move to Chicago.  Keckley escorted her, but Keckley returned to her DC business after Mary was settled.  The two women remained close and  corresponded, so when Lincoln ran into financial difficulty and wanted to sell some of her clothing, Keckley went with her to New York to find a market.  Unfortunately the story came to light and became known as the “old clothes” scandal. Lincoln was pounced on by the press for daring to sell her clothes to raise money.

Keckley published her ghostwritten autobiography, Behind the Scenes, Or, Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House in 1868.  Keckley apparently thought her book would help restore her former employer’s reputation, but in that day, the idea that a “colored” had stepped out to tell “behind the scenes” stories was viewed poorly. Mrs. Lincoln felt betrayed by the woman she described as “my best living friend,” and Elizabeth Keckley’s reputation was ruined.  Mary Lincoln’s friends took their business elsewhere.

A representative of the alma mater of Keckley’s son came forward to help.  In 1892 she was offered a faculty position at Wilberforce University as head of the Department of Sewing and Domestic Science Arts.  Within a year, she was organizing a dress exhibit for the Chicago World’s Fair.

Her last years did not sustain this positive momentum.  She ended life in Washington in 1907; she was living at the National Home for Destitute Colored Women and Children when she died.

First African-American to Practice Medicine in the U.S.

James Derham was born into slavery in Philadelphia.  He was owned by three doctors in the area.  In one of the households he learned to read and write.

In 1788 he was sold to a prominent surgeon in New Orleans, and the surgeon encouraged Derham to learn medicine. He showed great aptitude at helping others, and he also quickly learned the art of surgery.

He either paid for or was given his freedom (reports vary) and was permitted to practice among the freemen and slaves of New Orleans.  He was popular for his medical knowledge but also his fluency in speaking French, English, and Spanish. He would have been a godsend to African-Americans who would not have been allowed to visit a white doctor.

Dr. Benjamin Rush, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and a well-respected physician of the day, visited New Orleans and was introduced to James Derham.  He is quoted as saying about Derham: “I conversed with him on medicine and surgery and found him learned. I thought I could give him information concerning the treatment of disease, but I learned more from him than he could expect from me.” (From the Journal of the National Medical Association, Volume 4, No.1.)

Though James Derham’s skills were well-known and his practice flourished, New Orleans passed regulations in 1801 that prevented him from practicing medicine since he had no formal medical degree.

He disappeared after 1802.

What a loss.

First woman to be featured on the cover of Business Week (1954)

Almost every American home has plastic storage containers for leftover food or homemade goodies. In some cases, the containers are Tupperware; in other cases they are products imitating this category leader that became popular in the 1950s.

Tupperware plastic storage containers were first created by Earl Tupper (1907-83), and they were a unique product because plastic was rarely used for home products at the time. Tupper, an inventor, gained access to plastic that the DuPont company no longer needed, and he began experimenting. He found ways to fashion plastic containers that he thought would be helpful in storing foods, and he developed a “burping seal” lid that he patented to “lock in freshness.”

Though the product was useful and innovative, people were skeptical of plastic and stuck with their old methods of food storage which usually involved keeping food in metal or glass, neither of which could be sealed tightly for temporary storage.

The person who was to lead Tupperware to prominence was Brownie Wise (1913-1992), who proved to be masterful at implementing a direct sales method that led to skyrocketing company sales and domination of the food storage market.

About Brownie Wise

Born Brownie Humphrey in a small town in rural Georgia, Brownie’s parents divorced when she was young and her mother, who had been a hat maker, traveled a good deal when she became intent on organizing a union to protect hat makers.  Brownie was left in the care of an aunt who was a dressmaker.

In 1936 Brownie won an art contest, and because of this she was invited to paint a mural at the Texas Centennial in Dallas where she met Robert Wise. Later that year, Brownie and Robert married and moved to Detroit where Robert Wise became a machinist. Brownie gave birth to their only son but within three years, the couple divorced leaving Brownie to raise their son on her own.

To support herself and her son, Brownie took various jobs including ones at an ad agency and a millinery shop.  She still needed extra cash so Brownie became a sales representative for Stanley Home Products.  The company sold cleaning supplies, kitchen necessities, and mops and brushes via home parties that could be scheduled around her other work commitments.  (The home party sales technique had actually been pioneered by Norman W. Squires (1908-2006) who worked for Aluminum Cooking Utensil Company of America; Squires moved to Stanley Home Products where he introduced the method there.  He was eventually hired by Earl Tupper and started a Hostess party division but did not stay with the company for long.)

Brownie excelled at selling Stanley Home Products, and she and a few other reps began adding in Tupperware products to their home party system.  By explaining to women the benefits of plastic and demonstrating how to “burp” the lid to get an airtight seal, Brownie did extraordinarily well selling the product.

Her sales results caught the attention of Earl Tupper who soon recruited her to run his marketing program and be vice president of the company.  Tupper and Wise removed Tupperware from store shelves and switched it to be sold exclusively on the home party plan.

Growing the Company

In neighborhoods where the Tupperware company was trying to get a foothold, they would send a representative door to door to ask housewives to run a “carrot experiment.” A few carrots would be placed in a Tupperware container and several other carrots would be placed in whatever the housewife would normally have used for storage.  Several days later the representative would return to compare freshness; most of the time, they gained a new recruit to work as a Tupperware party-giver and sales representative.

Wise also developed what she called Tupperware’s Jubilee, a four-day sales meeting that included motivational speeches, entertainment, and new product introductions.  Wise incentivized her sales force by offering extraordinary gifts such appliances, trips, and even a speedboat or two.

In 1951 Wise had about 200 women selling Tupperware; by 1954 the sales force had grown to over 9000.  This extraordinary growth led to her begin featured on the cover of Business Week magazine.

For several years, Wise was the face of the company; Earl Tupper preferred to avoid the limelight, but in late 1957 there was a power struggle and the board of directors forced her out.  Wise sued but settled out of court for about $30,000.  A few years later, Tupper sold the company for $16 million.

Wise went on to start several cosmetic companies employing direct sales, and later she invested in real estate but nothing ever brought the success that she achieved with Tupperware.

Today Tupperware is still marketed using the method begun by Brownie Wise with almost 2 million consultants worldwide.

One hundred years ago people had the same desire to see, to think about, to be entertained by stories, but of course, there were no films, not even silent movies. There were, however, cycloramas. These were panoramic paintings, usually of historical events, that were designed to be viewed by an audience that could move about on a central platform to examine the enormous painting that encircled them. During each viewing, a guide would tell the story of what was happening in the painting, often with musical accompaniment. The overall effect was to make audiences feel they were in the midst of the action.

The first cyclorama was painted by an Irishman, Robert Barker, who was said to have climbed to the top of a hill near Edinburgh and was so awed by the view that he determined to create a way to depict a similar view artistically. As the art of creating cycloramas became more widely practiced, their creation proved to be quite complex. These cylindrical paintings were enormous, about 40-50 feet high and 300-400 feet in circumference. To provide visitors with a “you are there” feeling, the artist/designer needed to make some sophisticated adjustments in perspective.

Teams of workers were necessary to create a cyclorama. Certain workers prepared the huge canvas; others erected the scaffolds; a team of artists, most of whom had a specialty such as landscape painting or a particular gift for painting humans or horses, moved from section to section of the painting, adding in the art they did best.

Special buildings were created for the display of these paintings. Dioramas were often constructed in the foreground to add to the feeling of realism. As more buildings were erected for their display, the cycloramas began to be designed so that they could be taken down, rolled up, and transported to a new location.
Cycloramas became so popular that Pulitzer-Prize-winning Civil War historian James M. McPherson, told me that communities that did not have special buildings for their display would arrange for viewings of the paintings in regular auditoriums with men unrolling the painting scene-by-scene while a narrator described what the audiences were seeing.

The fellow who became a leader in designing and painting cycloramas was Paul Philippoteaux (1846-1923). Following the success of several of his paintings depicting European battle scenes, Philippoteaux was commissioned by an American merchant to paint the “greatest battle of the Rebellion,” Pickett’s Charge. (Pickett’s Charge was an attempt by the Confederacy to penetrate the Union line at Gettysburg. The attempt failed, causing Robert E. Lee to call for a retreat by the Confederates, which brought the Battle of Gettysburg to a close.)

In the early 1880s, Philippoteaux came to the United States, where he visited the battlefield and interviewed a good number of the participants, sketching as he went. He also enlisted local photographer William H. Tipton to shoot a series of photographs. Later the photographs were pasted together to provide Philippoteaux with a blueprint for the background for the cyclorama.

Philippotoeaux’s first painting of Pickett’s Charge was presented in Chicago. Over a half million people visited it during the first year, and as a result, a Chicago businessman commissioned Philippoteaux to paint a second one which was soon sold to a company that placed it in Boston. Eventually, four versions of this work were painted.

Guides at the time were often military men who had been in the battle; the reports were probably very subjective and not all that accurate but they must have been exciting all the same. One fellow who wrote about seeing the Boston cyclorama in 1885 wrote: [It's as if...] you can see for 15 miles all-around. Thousands and thousands of soldiers–horses–cannon–everything in a battle–about 40 feet on every side of you …” [from the Sue Boardman collection, as cited in The Battle of Gettysburg Cyclorama by Sue Boardman and Kathryn Porch.]

Most buildings that could display a cyclorama were in large cities where more tickets could be sold, and so “Pickett’s Charge” was not placed at Gettysburg until 1913. The particular version eventually given for display at the battlefield was one that was acquired by department store magnate Albert Hahne, according to The Battle of Gettysburg Cyclorama by Boardman and Porch. After Hahne acquired it, it was first displayed in the Grand Court of the Newark department store, Hahne & Company, where Hahne also arranged for it to be photographed section by section. Despite the deterioration that had taken place by that time, these photographs have been an invaluable resource for those studying the painting.

In June 1912 the Gettysburg Battle Picture Association received a charter from the Pennsylvania legislature to erect a building to house the painting. Hahne himself contributed $7,000, and from 1913-62 the painting was housed in a building that was intended to be only a temporary home. There was no climate control of any sort, leading to further deterioration.

In 1948 emergency repairs were undertaken to try to restore the painting but it continued to be housed in this same building. Then in 1959 the painting suffered further damage from misguided efforts to restore it. Finally in 1999 park superintendent John Latschar put together a plan to preserve the painting as part of his overall plan for the Gettysburg site. The painting had to undergo multiple cleanings and much of the work done to repair it in the past and to be undone, before a proper plan could be made. Battlefield Foundation president Robert Wilburn, contractor Robert Kinsley, conservator David Olin, and a team of historians and artists worked to bring the painting back from ruin.

Today only about 30 cycloramas survive, and the newly restored, magnificent “Pickett’s Charge” is a highlight of the reeently completed Visitor Center at Gettysburg National Military Park.

If you come to Gettysburg, view the battlefields, and see the cyclorama, you will be reminded that in the 1860s, there was no guarantee that the United States would remain unified…it could just as easily have collapsed as a “grand experiment.” Fortunately for us, it did not.

As President Abraham Lincoln concluded in the Gettysburg Address, the Civil War was a “new birth of freedom” so that “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from this earth.”

Come experience it for yourself: http://www.gettysburgfoundation.org/

To receive monthly updates on interesting stories of America, send me an email: kate@americacomesalive.com

And if you can possibly sneak away this week to visit one of the parks’ 394 properties, you should: those that charge admission are waiving fees for the week.

The Original Concept

The concept for a national park system is generally credited to George Catlin (1796-1872), an artist who traveled the West painting Native Americans.  He traveled extensively, eventually visiting more than fifty different tribes.  While visiting the Dakotas in 1832 he worried about the encroachment of westward expansion. Catlin is quoted as having written that the lands should be preserved “by some great protecting policy of government …in a magnificent park…A nation’s park, containing man and beast in all the wild and freshness of their nature’s beauty!”

The first step in this direction was taken in 1864 when Congress donated Yosemite Valley to the state of California for preservation.  But then in 1872, Congress wanted to do something similar for Yellowstone, and there was not yet a state entity that could take charge of so vast a land.  For that reason, Congress determined that Yellowstone would be reserved as a “public park or pleasuring-ground for the benefit and enjoyment of the people.”  Yellowstone was placed in the custody of the U.S. Department of the Interior and thus became the first national park.

In the 1890s and early 1900s, Congress added other parks to this collection: Sequoia, Yosemite and Mount Rainer as well as Crater and Glacier Lakes.  The preservation of prehistoric Indian ruins also became part of this movement with the 1889 protection of Arizona’s Casa Grande Ruin; then in 1906 Mesa Verde National Park was created.  Theodore Roosevelt also took the opportunity to place 18 national monuments under the protection of the Department of the Interior.

In the mid-1910s there were more issues—and a lot of properties—requiring better management, so in 1916 President Woodrow Wilson approved legislation to create a National Park Service within the Department of the Interior.

Eastward Expansion

By the 1920s, the lack of preservation of properties in the east was becoming notable; the movement had begun in the West, so the efforts had been largely focused in that area.  Only Acacia National Park in Maine lay east of the Mississippi.  But over time, the Park Service began to look eastward, absorbing the Shenandoah, the Great Smoky Mountains, and Mammoth Cave among other properties.  The next big expansion came in the 1930s when the Park Service took over the management of the national military parks and monuments.  Whether you are visiting the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, the Henry House Museum at Manassas or the Gettysburg Battlefield, those properties are now under the Park Service umbrella.

Public and Private Partnerships

While the original intent was preservation, American business soon caught wind of the possibility of tourism, and today preservation and tourism go hand in hand with the government entering into compatible public and private partnerships.  (Journey Through Hallowed Ground along the eastern seaboard is a great example of a private group creating an umbrella organization to link and create appreciation for national sites.)

In the last forty years, the Park system has brought focus to the importance of educating the public, and each site has re-evaluated the interpretation of each site’s domain.  A location like Custer Battlefield, once a monument to white man’s “last stand” has been reinterpreted to tell the story from both sides… Custer and his men have their moment but the story of the Native Americans is presented as well.  Scholarship is ongoing.

This week… or anytime this year… give yourself a treat and visit just one of the 394 property’s managed by the National Park Service.  They are true treasures, and we are fortunate that the land and the monuments are being held for all Americans to enjoy.

On April 20, 2012 most of the Boston citizenry will be wearing something that designates them as the loyal Red Sox fans that they are.  Tomorrow they will celebrate the centennial their beloved ballpark with a game against the New York Yankees.  One hundred years ago on this date they played the New York Highlanders who would later become the Red Sox arch rivals–the New York Yankees.  (In that first game, the Red Sox were victorious.)

Boston Red Sox fans love their ballpark. The fans have shown little interest in a state-of-the-art stadium; they remain loyal to Fenway. Built in 1912, Fenway is the oldest ballpark still in active use in the major leagues, and very little about it has changed since its opening day one hundred years ago.

Green Monster
When the park was being revamped in the 1930s by then owner Tom Yawkey, a major fire broke out in the wooden structure near left field, and much was destroyed. To avert another similar disaster, the area was rebuilt in metal, creating what is now affectionately known as the Green Monster. (For many years, it was simply known as “the wall.”) The wall was originally just 25 feet high and separated Lansdowne Street from the outfield, but it was expanded to its current height of 37 feet in 1934 and painted green in 1947. The seats above the Green Monster were not added until 2003.

Fenway still features a manual scoreboard that is that the line score is still posted manually, adjusting 16-inch high numbers, inning by inning, as well as scores for the day’s other American games. The sign also features two vertical strips that spell out the initials of former team owners Tom Yawkey and Jean Yawkey (TAY and JRY) in Morse code. In 1934 when the scoreboard was installed it was state of the art, with lights representing balls and strikes.

Before the 2011 season, three new scoreboards beyond right-center were installed including a video board in right field.

The Red Seat
Seat 21, Row 37, Section 42 is painted red, to mark the longest home run ever hit at Fenway. Ted Williams hit a Fred Hutchinson pitch on June 9, 1946 that traveled 502 feet, further than any other hit. Since that time, Manny Ramirez hit a home run that measured 463 feet and another that hit a light tower, denying it an actual landing point, so officials have deferred to Williams’ homer as the record-holder. Babe Ruth may have hit a homerun that measured 545 feet in 1926 but this pre-dated the bleachers.

Old-Style Game Notification
And one final note from the website, www.RedSoxDiehard.com:
The older John Hancock building in Boston uses red and blue lights in its beacon to give a local three-hour weather forecast.

The following rhyme reveals the code:
Steady blue, clear view.
Flashing blue, clouds due.
Steady red, rain ahead.
Flashing red, snow instead.

Flashing red is also used in the summer to mean the Red Sox game has been rained out.

And in October 2004, the tower used flashing blue and red together for the first time, to commemorate the World Series win:
Flashing blue and red, the Curse is dead!

Once the stress of filing is out of the way, one might well wonder when we began paying a tax on income.
From the beginning, the Constitution has given Congress the power “To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States.” (Article 1, Section 8, Clause 1)

Income Taxes Began with the Civil War
Up until the Civil War, our government’s expenses were covered by consumption-based taxes including property taxes, tariffs and duties on goods purchased abroad. Taxing income first began in the 1860s when President Abraham Lincoln and Congress enacted a temporary tax to pay war expenses. The system was modeled on a relatively new tax method begun in Britain. It was tested and upheld by the Supreme Court in 1864 (Springer v. the U.S.).

During the War, the initial rate was 3 percent on income over $800, an income amount for which few qualified. The law was soon modified, and a two-tier system was created. Incomes between $600 and $10,000 were taxed at 3 percent, while higher incomes were taxed at 5 percent. By the end of the war, 10 percent of all Union households paid some form of income tax, and 21 percent of the Union’s war revenue was gained through this method of taxation.

Law Permitting Income Tax Allowed to Expire
After the Civil War, the United States entered a period of expansion (building the railroads, reconstruction, converting war industry to peacetime industry); public funding was required. However in 1872 lawmakers allowed the temporary Civil War income tax to expire.

There was, however, constant political pressure on Congress to restore the income tax; Congress introduced more than sixty bills between 1871 and 1894 to restore the income tax but to no avail.

In 1892 Democratic candidate Grover Cleveland was elected president on a platform promising to reduce tariffs. Tariffs were seen as protective of capitalists so they would not have price competition from foreign imports and harmful to the common person who had to pay higher prices for goods.
Democrats saw that if tariffs came down then government expenses needed to be covered another way so they added to what is known as the Wilson-Gorman Tariff Act of 1894 a 2 percent flat tax on all incomes over $4,000. Fewer than 5 percent of Americans would have been affected, but Republicans and many northern Democrats were furious about both the lower tariffs and the income tax. After the law passed in the House, the Senate gutted the tariff provisions making the rates only slightly lower than they had been previously. As a result, a much weaker tariff law passed but the provision for an income tax remained.

Then things got complicated. Everyone understood that a basic tax on salary was provided for in the Constitution, but the complication concerned income derived from property investment such as collection of rent money or investment income. This type of income was generally classified as a direct tax, and the Constitution specified that direct and indirect taxes were to be handled differently. (Direct taxes must be proportional, across the states.)

In the tariff bill of 1894 the law tried to include income on property as an indirect tax (and therefore not subject to being proportional). It was on this basis that the Supreme Court tossed the law, ruling that it was unconstitutional to consider income from property as an indirect tax. It was a hot button issue, and after a second opportunity to vote on the case because one justice had been out ill for the first vote, the Supreme Court struck down the entire law, choosing to set aside the precedent established in 1864 which deemed to be legal the income tax of the 1860s.

Passage of the 16th Amendment
Finally in 1913 the 16th Amendment was ratified by 42 of the 48 states, giving Congress the “power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several states.”

That year, Congress levied a 1 percent tax on incomes of more than $3,000 (about $70,000 today), and a 6 percent tax on incomes of more than $500,000. It also introduced Form 1040, the same basic form that we file today.

As of that date, the first year, no taxes were collected. Citizens were simply required to complete the form and the IRS checked for accuracy. Later as taxes began being collected, there was a growing need for more workers—professional collectors who understood what they were doing rather than “patronage” appointments. It was still tough to manage the work flow however. In 1919, the Bureau was processing returns from 1917.

While the system has been computerized and is much more up-to-date, Americans know there is still a lot of room for improvement. However that’s how the income tax process all began.