1920s
The Making of An American
The immigrant's story: twas ever thus.
Posted By: Paul - Sun Mar 19, 2023 -
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Category: Emigrants, Immigrants and Borders, Ethnic Groupings, Jobs and Occupations, Languages, PSA’s, 1920s
Thirty Years Among the Dead
The Wikipedia page for Wickland, where we learn:Wickland turned away from conventional medical psychology and toward the belief that psychiatric illnesses were the result of influence by spirits of the dead. Wickland came to believe that a large number of his patients had become possessed by what he called "obsessing spirits", and that low-voltage electric shocks could dislodge them, while his wife Anna acted as a medium to guide them to "progress in the spirit world". Spiritualists considered him an authority on "destructive spirits" and he wrote a book in 1924, Thirty Years Among the Dead, detailing his experiences as a psychical researcher.[3]
Wickland was convinced that he was in contact with a group of spirits known as the "Mercy Band" who would remove the possessors, and help them in the spirit world. Psychologist Robert A. Baker listed Wickland and Arthur Guirdham as early psychiatrists who preferred to "ignore the science and embrace the supernatural".[4]
Read his book at the Internet Archive.
Posted By: Paul - Mon Mar 13, 2023 -
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Category: Death, Supernatural, Occult, Paranormal, Books, 1920s
Visit Gay’s Lion Farm
The Wikipedia page.A very detailed article on the place, with lots of photos.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Mar 02, 2023 -
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Category: Animals, Eccentrics, Hollywood, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s
FINNEGANS WAKE on Audio
Ease yourself into this famously baffling masterpiece by listening to Joyce himself proclaim a passage. Then queue up the whole book on your car's sound system for a relaxing commute!
Posted By: Paul - Thu Feb 23, 2023 -
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Category: Literature, Unexplained Historical Enigmas, 1920s, Cacophony, Dissonance, White Noise and Other Sonic Assaults
Miss America Gets a Permanent Wave
Norma Smallwood's victory in the 1926 Miss America contest was widely credited to her long, straight hair, which was widely admired. So it made news when she decided to get a permanent wave. It also made an unusual photo.Standing with her, below, was Charles Nessler, inventor of the permanent wave machine. (More info about him here.)
I haven't been able to find any photos showing what she looked like after getting the permanent wave. In fact, in all the later photos her hair still seems very straight. Perhaps she didn't like the result.
source: Library of Congress
Pittsburgh Press - Oct 17, 1926
Minneapolis Journal - Oct 3, 1926
Posted By: Alex - Fri Feb 17, 2023 -
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Category: 1920s, Hair and Hairstyling
Curing insane women by beauty treatments
I doubt this actually cured anyone, but as the article notes, it was certainly an improvement on the old way of treating mental illness.Rouge, powder, lipsticks, eyebrow pencils and all the other implements of artificial beauty are provided, so that the women can make up to their heart's content, regardless of the somewhat weird results sometimes obtained... It is a part of the system to let the "customer" direct her own beautification as much as is possible.
Pittsburgh Sun Telegraph - July 14, 1929
Click to Enlarge
Posted By: Alex - Tue Feb 14, 2023 -
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Category: Beauty, Ugliness and Other Aesthetic Issues, 1920s, Mental Health and Insanity
Gus Comstock, Champion Coffee Drinker
Gus Comstock of Minnesota set a record back in 1927 by drinking 85 cups of coffee in 7 hours and 15 minutes.
Bridgewater Courier-News - Jan 18, 1927
Others subsequently claimed to have beaten his record. Albert Baker of San Francisco claimed to have drunk 157 cups of coffee in 6 hours 20 minutes. However, Comstock complained that there was nothing official about his challenger's claims. They just said they had beaten his record. And Comstock ended up being the most well-remembered champion coffee drinker. Stumbeano's Coffee Roasters (located in Comstock's home town of Fergus Falls) now sells a "Gus Comstock Blend" of coffee.
source: stumbeanos.com
I haven't been able to find any more recent coffee-drinking records. Probably because drinking that much coffee has to be potentially lethal.
Back in my twenties I used to regularly drink 3 or 4 cups a day. Nowadays I limit myself to one cup in the morning.
More info: clickamericana.com
Washington Evening Star - Jan 14, 1927
Posted By: Alex - Tue Jan 03, 2023 -
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Category: World Records, Coffee and other Legal Stimulants, 1920s
1920s Motorized Skis
We previously featured caterpillar-tread skis, but here's an earlier, alternate technology.Full patent here.
Posted By: Paul - Fri Dec 16, 2022 -
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Category: Death, Sports, 1920s
Houses Integrated with Trees
I once ate at a restaurant in Medellin, Colombia, which featured a massive tree in the dining area that grew up through the roof. The urge to blend trees with houses is an ancient one.Here's an instance from 1920.
This article details modern occurences of the motif.
Posted By: Paul - Mon Dec 12, 2022 -
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Category: Architecture, Domestic, Nature, 1920s
Charles Garland and his Love Farm
Elon Musk, stand back!If you inherited a ton of money at a young age, you too might be confused about how to live. At first, you might radically decide not to accept the fortune. Then, you might decide to use it for charitable purposes. Finally, you might opt to establish a free-love commune.
That's the path that one Charles Garland took. Read his whole story at Wikipedia.
After his separation from his wife, Garland established two successive agricultural communes, or "colonies of idealists", both named April Farm.[19] The first April Farm, in which Garland lived from January 1922, was at North Carver, Massachusetts.[22] In 1924, Garland moved to a new "April Farm" in Lower Milford Township, Pennsylvania.[19]
Garland scandalized polite society by inviting young women to live with him at these colonies, where he planned to "work out the problems of life".
Naturally, newspapers had a field day with all this.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Nov 10, 2022 -
Comments (3)
Category: Money, Communes, Utopias, and Other Alternative Societies, Public Indecency, Bohemians, Beatniks, Hippies and Slackers, 1920s
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| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1. Contact Us |