Alpine Blitch, Miami News, 14 February 1929.
Here’s to you, A Handful of History - 5 creative things on history I thought were worth sharing. Enjoy!
Freak Shows. In the 1800s, freak shows - exhibitions of physically unusual humans - were quite popular. I’ve always felt sorry for the performers, well, at least until I read an article about Joseph Merrick - known as the ‘Elephant Man’ - in which it was suggested that his performances actually helped him earning his own money and that he, in that way, was able to keep a more independent lifestyle (than if he had stayed in the workhouse to which he was admitted when he was 17 years old). This article about Alpine Blitch - aka the ‘Florida Fat Girl’ - also raises the question: Should we feel sorry for her or rather applaud her for her ability to create a life on her own terms? She did have quite an interesting time, more varied than women usually experienced those days, as the article points out.
Kung Fu Nuns. “Lots of people think that as a Buddhist nun you just do meditation. But we believe that helping others is our religion… [and] sitting in one place doing meditation is not that effective these days. " The nuns of the 900-year-old Drukpa Lineage in Nepal are practicing the deadly martial art of Kung Fu. How cool is that!
Premieres. I am very much looking forward to the final season of ‘The Crown’, coming up on 15 November (Netflix). In some countries a new documentary about Billie Holiday - ‘Billie’ - is released 13 November. The trailer looks promising! It’s colourised by the Brazilian artist Marina Amaral, who also added colours to the book ‘The Colour of Time - A New History of the World 1850-1960’. Read my review of the book here.
Fleshy, passionate, earthy excitement. “The Victorians created this idea that sex was in the mind .. it was something that had to be fixed. We all became hyper-aware of what was wrong, and sex was seen as wrong. And saving our modern culture from that is something we need to do. We need to go back to the Medieval period, to the 1600s. We need to return to fleshy, passionate, earthy excitement.” I’ve been listening to the radio program ‘How we talk about sex and women’s bodies’ and I suggest you do the same. It’s most interesting, very moving - and fun too. Tip: If you want to learn about sex in the past you can start by looking at the language, Dr. Kate Lister, researcher of the history of sexuality, suggests.
Beautiful! Oh, how I enjoy this online catalogue of the botanical artwork from Captain James Cook's first Pacific voyage (which took place in 1768-1771). This red-green beauty - Arum italicum - is from Madeira. “HMS Endeavour arrived in Madeira off the northwest coast of Africa, on 12 September 1768 to take on fresh supplies before crossing the Atlantic. Joseph Banks and his party immediately set to work listing 230 plant species, 25 of which were new to Western science”.
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Majken xx
”The Kiss”, 1896. Featuring May Irwin and John C. Rice.
“The Kiss” is one of the first films ever shown commercially to the public. It is 18 seconds long and produced by Thomas Edison in 1896. It shows the final scene of the stage musical ‘The Widow Jones’, and according to sources, it caused a scandalized uproar at the time. One contemporary critic wrote, "The spectacle of the prolonged pasturing on each other's lips was beastly enough in life-size on the stage but magnified to gargantuan proportions and repeated three times over it is absolutely disgusting." ("gargantuan proportions"...Oh my!)
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