AUGUST 10 – 1874 Happy Birthday Herbert Hoover; 1821 Missouri is admitted to U.S.; 1809 Happy birthday Robert Cornelius (took world’s first selfie); 1846 Smithsonian created
AUGUST 10
1874 – Happy Birthday Herbert “The Chief” Hoover.
…Bert, as he was known to his friends, was the first President to be born west of the Mississippi River . Born in an Iowa village in 1874, his parents both passed away when he was nine, and he grew up with an uncle in Oregon. He worked on a farm splitting logs and clearing stumps, and learned bookkeeping at his uncle’s real estates business. Thanks to the help of a kind professor, he enrolled at Stanford University, where he met his future wife Lou Henry, and graduating as a mining engineer.
Traveling around the world using his mining degree, he found valuable mineral deposits, and created business enterprises to extract the resources making over 4 million dollars.
He married his Stanford sweetheart, Lou Henry, and they went to China, where he worked for a private corporation as China’s leading engineer. In June 1900 the Hoovers found themselves smack-dab in the middle of the Boxer Rebellion in Tientsin. For several weeks the settlement was under heavy fire. While Lou worked in the hospitals, Hoover very bravely directed protection of the building of barricades.
After the Armistice, Hoover continued his global operations and humanitarian causes. At the outbreak of WWI, helped 120,000 American citizens return home from Europe. After Germany took over Belgium, he he supplied aid to the Belgium citizens. As WWI raged on, he extended food and supplies to famine-stricken Soviet Russia in 1921. Once a critic asked if he was therefore not helping Bolshevism, Hoover told him, “Twenty million people are starving. Whatever their politics, they shall be fed!”
In 1917 President Woodrow Wilson appointed Hoover director of the Food Administration. He was loved and cherished everywhere because of his Humanitarian efforts, being praised throughout Europe from citizens thanking him for their so-called Hoover Lunches.
After capably serving as Secretary of Commerce under Presidents Harding and Coolidge, Hoover worked to save struggling industries such as radio broadcasting and civilian aviation, and began working on Hoover Dam, which would divide the Colorado River between Arizona and Nevada.
In 1928, He became the Republican Presidential nominee, saying: “We in America today are nearer to the final triumph over poverty than ever before in the history of any land.” He destroyed Democratic governor Alfred Smith of New York, by a historic record of 444-87 electoral votes. These were, after all, the prosperous Roaring 20s, and during his inauguration, he proudly stated “I have no fears for the future of our country. It is bright with hope.”
Is it now. Within months after Hoover’s election, the stock market crashed, and the Nation spiraled downward into the Great Depression. Unemployment rose from 3% to 23% and millions of Americans lost everything, eventually having to live in crappy little shacks in neighborhoods known as Hooverville.
Hoover responded to this by announcing that while he would keep the Federal budget balanced, he would cut taxes and expand public works spending.
Thanks a lot, Chief. The Stock Market crash of course had huge repercussions from Europe. Hoover presented a program to Congress asking for creation of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation to aid business, supplementary help for farmers struggling with mortgage foreclosures, banking reform, a loan to states for aiding the millions of unemployed, and expansion of public works. Hoover was a true conservative, and wanted the government to have as little control over this as possible, feeling too much involvement would undermine capitalism and individualism. While people must not suffer from hunger and cold, caring for them must be primarily a local and voluntary responsibility.
During his 1930 State of the Union speech, he exclaimed: “Prosperity cannot be restored by raids upon the public Treasury.”Not quite the New Deal Americans would want later on. The Democrats in Congress, who he felt were sabotaging his program for their own political gain, criticized Hoover as being a callous and cruel President. Hoover was blamed for the Depression and was badly defeated in election of 1932 to FDR, who came into Presidency with the New Deal to enact programs for progressive reforms and economic relief programs for all American people. . In the 1930’s Hoover sharply criticized the New Deal, warning against tendencies toward statism.
Hoover returned to public office, and in 1947 President Truman appointed him to a commission, which he was elected chairman, to restructure the Executive Departments. His commission was extended under President Eisenhower in 1953.
Many economies resulted from both commissions’ recommendations, and public view of Hoover began rising up again. Over the years, Hoover wrote dozens of articles and books, one of which he was working on when he quietly passed away at the ripe old age of 90 in New York City on October 20, 1964. Happy birthday Bert!
1821 – Happy birthday Missouri, which by the way was described by Sioux Indians as for town of the large canoes. Part of the Louisiana Purchase was admitted as a slave state as a result of the Missouri compromise. During the Civil War, Missouri’s was truly on both sides of the blue and grey. Some other fun facts about Missouri, it is the home of Aunt Jemima, Mark Twain,T.S. Elliot, Tennessee Williams, and Harry Truman. Missouri is known as the Cave state due to the 6,000 caves there. We were shown great inventions at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, including cotton candy, iced tea, and Dr. Pepper. So there you have it. Happy birthday Missouri.
1809 — Happy birthday photography pioneers Robert Cornelius, the man who took the world’s first selfie
. In October 1839 he used a daguerreotype. A daguerreotype is an early photo developing process which used an iodine-sensitive silvered plate and mercury vapor. Doesn’t that sound healthy! The shot was taken in the backyard of his family’s store in Philly. His arms were crossed and his hair was a little messy. Between 1841 and 1843 Cornelius ran two of the first photo studios, and the industry quickly began to grow. Rather than growing with it, Cornelius stuck to the family store and retired in his ranch in Philly. He died August 10, 1893.
1889 – Happy birthday Charles Darrow. He’s credited with inventing the Monopoly board game. In fact versions of the game that went by other names had been floating around in the Midwest prior to this, but Darrow, his wife and son designed the board game we play today, including the famous graphics for the Chance, community chest cards, as well as the large red Go arrow and other aspects.
1846 – The Smithsonian is created. James Smithson was a British scientist who wrote a very interesting clause in his will for when he died, that his nephew would inherit all his wealth. The weird part was the note after that, which stated that if his nephew died childless, then the wealth should go to “the United States of America found at Washington, under the name of the Smithsonian Institution, an Establishment for the increase & diffusion of knowledge among men.” And so it was. Nephew died childless, and turned out Smithson was pretty darn rich! He left a half million dollars in gold alone, plus his mineral collection, library, scientific notes, and more goodies.
Congress debated on what to do with this very generous gift, such as a national university, a public library, or an astronomical observatory. It was finally agreed to make it a museum, library, and a program of research, publication, and collection in the sciences, arts and history.
Its establishment was signed by President James Polk in 1846.These days the Smithsonian is very informative and educational in matters of science, innovation, arts & culture, and so so much more.