Milestones: Monday, November 27, 2023

November 27, 2023 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

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‘DEUS VULT!’ — THE HOLY LAND IN THE MIDDLE EAST HAS BEEN THE CENTER OF CONFLICT FOR MILLENNIA, in part because of the quest for power. Pope Urban II, on Nov. 27, 1095, gave an influential speech from which the Crusades began. This early second-millennium pope was known as an effective reformer, particularly against simony (the selling of ecclesiastical positions) and other clerical abuses that were commonplace during the Middle Ages. So the situation involving the Seljuk Turks’ seizing control of Jerusalem — a holy site for Judaism, Christianity and Islam — presented to Pope Urban not only the chance to reclaim the Holy Land but also to unify Europe’s Christians. The Crusades, which lasted almost from 1095 until 1291, were a series of military campaigns with the goal of regaining control of the Holy Land from the Muslims.

Christians, since the 6th century C.E. (Common era), had made frequent pilgrimages to the land of Christ’s birth. However, the violent warfare and hatred that the Crusades engendered were mitigated by St. Francis of Assisi in the 12th century. Captured and brought before the sultan, Francis quickly impressed the ruler with his love and engagement.

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‘THE FACTS … ARE HERE FOREVER’ — ALGER HISS, WHO WAS CONVICTED ON PERJURY CHARGES DURING THE HEIGHT OF THE COLD WAR, was released from prison on Nov. 27, 1954, after almost four years. A former government official, Hiss had been convicted in 1950 of lying to a federal grand jury about his complicity in smuggling secret government documents to a liaison named Whittaker Chambers, who in turn delivered the papers into the hands of Soviet agents. Hiss asserted that he had been framed and was innocent of these charges, and that he was a victim of the Red Scare.

However, dissenters believed that archived Soviet documents proved Hiss’ guilt as a Soviet spy. Whittaker Chambers himself was quoted: the “saddest single factor about the Hiss case is that nobody can change the facts as they are known…They are there forever. That is the inherent tragedy of this case.”

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FIRST NATIVE AMERICAN PRIMA BALLERINA — BALLERINA MARIA TALLCHIIEF MADE HER DEBUT IN THE NEW YORK CITY BALLET’S PRODUCTION OF ‘FIREBIRD’ ON NOV. 27, 1949. Born in 1925 on the Osage reservation in Oklahoma to a Native American father and Scottish-Irish mother, Tallchief studied with celebrated ballerina Bronslava Nijinska and moved to New York City at age 17 to pursue a career in dance. She was gifted with a strong, sleek and athletic build and could glide through the challenging choreography of George Ballantine, with whom she collaborated. “Firebird” was a commissioned work from Russian composer Igor Stravinsky. Tallchief would become the first Native American prima ballerina.

During a time when Europe and Russia dominated the ballet scene, Maria Tallchief brought her nation to the forefront by originating and introducing other iconic roles in Balanchine ballets, such as Sugar Plum Fairy in “The Nutcracker” and the Swan Queen in “Swan Lake.” After she retired from the stage, Tallchief was appointed ballet director of the Lyric Opera, and she founded the Chicago City Ballet.

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DIARY ENTRY ON HER BOSS’ WEIGHT — ELIZABETH JAFFRAY, A WHITE HOUSE HOUSEKEEPER ON NOV. 27, 1911, journaled a conversation she’d had with President William Howard Taft and his wife about the commander-in-chief’s ever-expanding waistline and was quoted in a 1926 book titled “Secrets of the White House.” Jaffray described a typical Taft breakfast that consisted of multiple helpings of toast with butter, a 12-oz. beefsteak and a “vast quantity of coffee with cream and sugar.” Taft, at 5’11, weighed between 270 and 340 lbs. through most of his adult life. However, leaving the White House seemed to improve his health: he dropped to 270 lbs. and went on to serve as the chief justice of the United States, a job he was said to relish much more than the Presidency.

However, even though he was a non-smoker and drank only an occasional beer, the obesity caught up with Taft, who also suffered from sleep apnea. He retired from the chief justice role due to poor health in March 1930 and died soon after from heart failure.

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THE CHANCELLOR — ROBERT R. (OR R.R.) LIVINGSTON, LATER KNOWN AS ‘THE CHANCELLOR,’ born on Nov. 27, 1746, in his family’s Clermont estate above the Hudson River, was the first of nine children born to Judge Robert Livingston and Margaret Beekman Livingston. The British army saved the family during a tenant uprising that was a consequence of the Livingstons’ approach to strict leasing. However, after Livington eventually sided with the colonists (Patriots), the British burned down Clermont. A graduate of Kings College (now Columbia University), Livingston distinguished himself as a lawyer and political leader. He helped draft the Declaration of Independence. Livingston served as secretary of foreign affairs under the Articles of Confederation and later accepted the post of chancellor of the state of New York: a title which followed him the rest of his life as a nickname.

It was this Robert Livington who negotiated the Louisiana Purchase during Thomas Jefferson’s Presidency. He also sponsored Robert Fulton’s steamboat invention, a fact mentioned in a recent feature in this Eagle section on the inventor. Both Fulton and Livingston had streets in Downtown Brooklyn named after them.

See previous milestones, here.