Milestones: Wednesday, July 5, 2023

July 5, 2023 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

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‘HOLLOW MOCKERY’ — Abolitionist and former slave Frederick Douglass preached one of his most famous speeches on July 5, 1852. Addressing the Rochester (New York) Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society, he declared, in a speech that was later published as a pamphlet, “What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass-fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages.”

Also a fierce proponent of women’s rights, particularly the right to vote, Frederick Douglass had been the only African-American to attend the Seneca Falls Convention (New York state) in 1848.

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‘THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH’ — PHINEAS TAYLOR (P.T.) BARNUM, born on July 5, 1810 in Bethel, Connecticut, gained a reputation as a “promoter of the bizarre and unusual.” By 1842, in his early thirties, he had already opened Barnum’s American Museum, which promoted unusual actions and performances. His recruiting of opera singer Jenny Lind, the “Swedish Nightingale,” attracted widespread attention. In 1871, his circus, billed as “The Greatest Show on Earth,” opened in Brooklyn, NY. Barnum merged with his rival J.A. Bailey in 1881 to form the Barnum and Bailey Circus. The Brooklyn Eagle of April 4, 1871 ran an extended front-page ad, announcing not only the event but Barnum’s marketing eloquence, which began, “Will Exhibit in Brooklyn, on Fulton Avenue [sic] and Hoyt Street, For One Week Only, Commencing April 10, The Largest, the Most Novel, the Most Interesting, and the Most Comprehensive Exhibition in All the World. P.T. Barnum’s Great Exposition of the Wonders of All Nations. An Entirely New and Unprecedentedly Brilliant Combination of Instructive Amusement.” Barnum also had a passion for politics and established the newspaper “Herald of Freedom,” which got him into trouble with the law. Although defeated in a Congressional race, he did serve as mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut, for a year.

Cecil B. DeMille’s 1952 movie, “The Greatest Show on Earth,” starring Betty Hutton, Charlton Heston, Cornel Wilde and James Stewart (as Buttons the Clown), was considered a “dazzling spectacle of life behind the scenes” at the Ringling Bros.-Barnum & Bailey Circus.

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A BATHING SUIT NAMED FOR A BOMBING SITE? — The BIKINI made its debut at a Paris fashion show on July 5, 1946. The skimpy two-piece bathing suit was a concept of French designer Louis Réard. Current events had a hand in the new fashion’s name. Earlier that week, an atoll (coral reef with lagoon), named Bikini Island, part of the Marshall Islands in the South Pacific, had been the site of a U.S.-conducted atomic test. The new apparel being modeled was said to reflect the “liberated spirit” of the Western Europeans during the summer of 1946 — the first war-free season in years — and the bikini quickly gained popularity in Europe.

However, the more puritanical United States was not as easily enamored of the bikini, and it took some 15 years — until the early 1960s — and a new generation of youths before the skimpy bathing suit was the rage. Songs like pop singer Brian Hyland’s “Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka-Dot Bikini” in 1960 as well as those by other artists by the Beach Boys, the California surfing scene, and the Frankie Avalon/Annette Funicello movies helped make the bikini more acceptable — provided one had a svelte figure.

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PIONEER OF THE AVANT-GARDE —The legendary French director, novelist and artiste JEAN COCTEAU, born on July 5, 1889, identified himself as simply a “poet,” which to him took in his other talents as well — novelist, playwright, filmmaker, director. Cocteau was one of the leading exponents of the Dada and Surrealism movements that emanated from World War I, which rejected conventional forms. Among his most notable works were the play “Orpheus” (1926), the novel “The Infernal Machine” (1934) and the films “The Blood of a Poet” (1930) and “Beauty and the Beast” (1946).

The National Observer once wrote of Jean Cocteau: “Of the artistic generation whose daring gave birth to Twentieth Century Art, Cocteau came closest to being a Renaissance man.”

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JUST 11 WEEKS AFTER JACKIE ROBINSON — LARRY DOBY broke the color line in baseball’s American League on July 5, 1947. He became the second Black player in the Major League, three months after Jackie Robinson’s debut with the National League’s Brooklyn Dodgers. Doby signed his contract with the Cleveland Indians (now the Cleveland Guardians), whose owner, Bill Veeck, had already called for the majors to integrate some five years before. Thus, Doby became the first Black player to come up directly from the Negro Leagues, since Robinson had come up from the Montreal Royals, a Brooklyn Dodgers farm team.

A lefty at bat but right-handed in his center-field position, Doby, along with fellow pioneering Black teammate Satchel Paige, helped lead the Indians to their World Series win the following year (1948). He also helped the Indians win the American League pennant in 1954, by which time Paige had left the team. Doby later managed the Chicago White Sox and retired in 1962.

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A SHIP NAMED BROOKLYN — DAVID FARRAGUT, BORN on July 5, 1801 at Knoxville, Tennessee as James Glasgow Farragut, was an accomplished and even precocious U.S. naval officer. He joined the Navy as a midshipman early at the tender age of 9 and secured a post as prize master (in charge of captured vessels) during the War of 1812, by the time he was 12. This was possible in large part because of his foster father, U.S. Naval Officer David Porter, with whom the youth lived after his mother’s death and adopted the name David. David Porter and Farragut’s bereaved father, George, had served together during the American Revolution. As a Southerner, David Farragut had to prove his loyalty to the Union; during the Civil War, he did just that. During the August 1864 Battle of Mobile Bay, he gained fame — and a vice-admiralty from President Abraham Lincoln — for his famous proclamation, commanding his fleet to ignore the Confederate defenses: “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!”

The ship to which Farragut bellowed that command was the USS Brooklyn, a wooden vessel (Farragut was stationed atop a neighboring vessel, the USS Hartford). One wonders whether the ship was manufactured at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Adjacent to the Navy Yard is a housing complex named in honor of Admiral Farragut; one can also find an eponymous road in Flatbush, near Ocean Avenue.

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KEPT IT A SECRET FOR EIGHT MONTHS — The FIRST CLONING OF AN ADULT ANIMAL was achieved on July 5, 1996 in Scotland when a lamb named Dolly was born that day, with a genetic composition identical to that of her mother. Cells that had been removed from a female six-year-old sheep’s mammary glands, and cultured in a lab with microscopic needles, which were part of the fertility methods being used since the 1970s. The eggs produced from those cells were then implanted into several ewes selected for surrogate motherhood before being injected into a number of ewes. One of these ewes then gave birth to Dolly, who was named after the famous country music singer Dolly Parton.

However, this achievement was not publicized to the world until Feb. 23, 1997, and the news immediately became controversial from an ethics standpoint. On March 4, President Bill Clinton wasted no time in imposing a ban on the federal funding of human cloning research, warning of the temptation to “play God,” according to a March 5 Washington Post story.

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THE RIGHT TO UNIONIZE — THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS ACT (THE WAGNER ACT) was signed on July 5, 1935. A triumph of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his allies in Congress, the Wagner Act guaranteed workers the right to organize and conduct collective bargaining with their employers. The Wagner Act also prohibited the formation of company unions — ones dominated or controlled by a specific employer — which did not have the autonomy of independent trade unions. In addition, the act created an enforcement agency, the National Labor Relations Board. The Wagner Act, named for New York’s then-U.S. Sen. Robert Wagner, would be tested two years later when members of the fledgling United Auto Workers held sit-down strikes and were successful in establishing contracts with both General Motors and Chrysler. Only the Ford Motor Company resisted, since the wealthy industrialist Henry Ford abhorred unions. Ford hired henchmen to fight back the UAW members, most famously in the 1937 “Battle of the Overpass.”

In 1941, the Ford Motor Company was found guilty of having violated the Wagner Act and ordered to pay back wages and restitution and to recognize the union. Ironically, Ford turned out to be more generous in his contract’s terms with the workers than was either G.M. or Chrysler — with competition a probable motivator.

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FOUGHT POVERTY WITH MILITARY MODEL — The Christian Mission, which later became the Salvation Army, was established on July 5, 1865 at London’s East End. Methodist and revivalist preacher William Booth and his wife Catherine, believing they must fight the evils of poverty as well as the religious indifference of their peers, founded the Christian Mission. He modeled his new sect after the British Army, with uniformed ministers being addressed as “officers” and converts as “recruits” — and, as importantly, with women ranked equal to men. The Mission then waged its “campaigns” into London’s most neglected and impoverished neighborhoods, establishing soup kitchens, offering spiritual counsel and material assistance to the destitute, and invoking the ire of the British establishment, who penalized the group for being “breakers of the peace.”

The organization was renamed the Salvation Army in 1878, and then expanded in the 1880s to the United States, opening its first branch in Pennsylvania. The Salvation Army gained respect for its relief work during the Great Depression and worked alongside the armed forces during both world wars.

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‘BABY JOHN’ — Dancer and choreographer Eliot Feld was born in Borough Park on July 5, 1942, according to Murray Polner’s 1982 book, “American Jewish Biographies.” A child dancer, he performed in George Balanchine’s original production of “The Nutcracker” as the Nutcracker Prince and was only 16 when he appeared in the 1957 Broadway production of “West Side Story.” He was then cast in the 1961 movie version of West Side Story as the youngest Jets gang member, “Baby John.” A prolific choreographer, Feld attended the High School of Performing Arts in New York and studied at the School of American Ballet and the New Dance Group.

Feld’s works have been described as aerobic and gymnastic, incorporating somersaults, push-ups, sprints, leaps and calisthenics, and blending elements of his Jewish background with Martha Graham’s choreography.

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CALLAS WAS TOSCA — Legendary opera diva Maria Callas gave her last performance at London’s Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, on July 5, 1965. Suffering from poor health, Callas had canceled her other appearances. But, since the Royal Opera House event was a charity fundraiser with the royal family, Callas garnered her strength and sang the role named for another impassioned opera diva so exquisitely that the audience demanded more than a dozen curtain calls.

Baritone Tito Gobbi, who in that performance sang the role of Tosca’s nemesis Police Chief Scarpia, was in real life a close friend of Maria Callas. She died in 1977 at age 53.

See previous milestones, here.