Thank you very much to Jory (@werewolfetone) for this beautiful double portrait of Mary Ann and Henry Joy McCracken, 18th/19th century Belfast's most dynamically revolutionary sibling duo! He is currently doing art commissions to support the people of Palestine--find his page with the information here.
Definitely check out his blog for some of the most thoughtful, entertaining, well-researched, and righteously indignant history/cultural commentary you're likely to see--as well as fascinating original art and characters.
And please support those still in desperate need in Gaza. Click here for a list of further places you can help with donations. If you can't give money, keep speaking out so that they are not forgotten.
Eighty-seven years ago, on June 25th, 1937, Colin Clive died in Los Angeles, California. This was a column that appeared in the Monday, June 28th edition of the Hollywood Citizen News, written by Edwin Martin--columnist, press agent, and acquaintance of Colin's. If I remember correctly, Gregory Mank quoted excerpts from this in his biography, but the article is worth reading in full. There's a poignant tribute underneath all the name-dropping.
Yeah, I know, not enough misery in the world these days, so it's time to dredge up more from the depths of the past. Still, it's an interesting glimpse into his life and death--and some of the people left behind.
Source: Hollywood Citizen News, Monday, June 28, 1937. Accessed via www.newspapers.com.
Transcript below.
CINEMANIA by Edwin Martin
JOURNEY'S END
"Think of all the chaps who've gone already. It can't be very lonely there--with all those fellows. Sometimes I think it's lonelier here."
Night after night we had heard him deliver those lines, and they never failed to touch us.
On this day they came back to us again--more poignantly than ever.
A few of us had gathered for a round-table at our favorite spot in Travaglini's--it was also his favorite corner that we occupied.
Just a few weeks before we had sat at this same table with him and planned a radio interview.
Soon after, when he went to the hospital, came a note in this manner: "Must have this old pump repaired a bit. Sorry we'll have to postpone our interview until I come out. Keep the corner warm at Travaglini's."
We had known him for many years--known him and admired him since they first brought him from England to star in the picture version of the same play he had made famous on the stage.
Later, when the play was revived by E.E. Clive, we enjoyed a most pleasant association while handling the publicity on the show during its run here at the Hollywood Playhouse.
During this time we got a little closer to this quiet, rather lonely man, who made famous the role of the hard-drinking Captain Stanhope in the stage and screen productions of "Journey's End."
Few knew it, but all during the past few months, even when he made such a hit in his outstanding part in "History is Made at Night," he had been carrying on under the constant shadow of a long illness--an illness which was gradually eating his heart out...but he never complained.
Sometimes there was a faraway look in his eyes as he talked--just that--nothing more--he was Captain Stanhope to the end.
A few of us were keeping the corner warm for him at Travaglini's that day when we heard Colin Clive had reached his journey's end.
WALTER BYRON, another fine young British actor, was studying his lines at the bar for the splendid part he plays with Sarah Padden in "Chilikoot Lou," with which Miss Padden soon returns to the vaudeville stage.
Eric Blore, inimitable English comedian, still in make-up, was also there...and Larry Kent, Hollywood's wandering actor, just back from directing and acting in England, was telling about a picture he wanted to make in the South Seas...Eddie Lee, known as England's "Donald Novis," was resting from his triumphant opening at the Century Club...and we were listening to the gentle elder Mr. Travaglini tell about stirring days when as a young man he was an officer in the Italian army...while Tony Travaglini, Jr., looked over a radio script planned as a welcome home to Harry Langdon.
Into this crowd of men came a saddened figure--a lovely woman who had been a friend of Colin. She was the last member of that gay trio who often occupied this same table together...from which another splendid young British actor, John Buckler, had left one night only to meet his journey’s end in Malibou Lake in a tragic auto accident.
She was the last one left—and she dragged her weary self up to the bar and ordered a double brandy.
Everyone wanted to ask about his condition, but Larry Kent was the only one who had the courage… “How is he?” he asked.
“He is going,” the woman said. “When I left he was already in the oxygen tent. They wouldn’t let me see him,” she said, trying desperately not to break down.
Because she knew that even a friend of Captain Stanhope must face unknown adventures with head held high.
A phone rang—it was for her—she answered it. Somehow the ominous tone of that ringing let us know the message. “He’s gone.”
Silently the glasses were filled…then Eric Blore lifted his glass. “I give you Colin Clive,” he said simply, and a toast was taken in his memory…and eventually each man filed out and went his separate way.
Somehow we believed that Colin Clive would have liked to know that his journey’s end had been accepted with such a gesture…as he went to that last rendezvous with his old friend, John Buckler...and as we walked out into the sunshine we remembered that we had other things to do--other things to write--but the only words we could think of were his gallant words from "Journey's End."
"Think of all the chaps who've gone already. It can't be very lonely there--with all those fellows. Sometimes I think it's lonelier here"....we are keeping the corner warm for you--Adios, Colin Clive.
The fact that this is where henry joy and mary ann mccracken got most of their formal education continues to be the funniest united irishmen fact ever to me. sending my 2 most republican children to Radicalism School
This reminds me of William Hazlitt and all the other prospective Unitarian ministers who went to the New College in Hackney and then rejected religion altogether. We keep sending our kids to be taught to think for themselves. Why do they end up as freethinkers and atheists?
Hi my name is cú chulainn who is sétanta the son of sualdam and conchobar's sister dechtire and I guard the house of culann (that's how I got my name) with hair that stands on end and one eye that closes and one eye that pops out like limpid tears and a lot of people tell me I look like my father sualdam (a/n if you don't know who that is get da hell out of here!). I'm not related to láeg but I wish I was because he's a major fucking hottie. I'm an ancient celt and my teeth are straight and white. I have pale white skin. I'm also an undefeated warrior, and I fight for the army of ulster where I'm the only one not afflicted by the curse (I'm seventeen). I'm the strongest warrior in ireland (in case you couldn't tell) and I wear mostly black. I love scáthach and I get all my weapons from her. for example today I was carrying my ball and my javelin and my hurley stick. I was being driven in my chariot to áth grena. it was snowing and raining and there was no sun, which I was very happy about. a lot of connachtmen stared at me. I put up my middle finger at them
The best part is that they were inspired by a diary entry from 1775, written by a 12 year old tailor’s apprentice who had been left unsupervised all day and decided to make a suit for a cat. Here’s a link to the blog post about it, but I’ll just paste the whole diary entry here:
“I had been at work about two months when Christmas came on – and here I must relate a little anecdote. The principal [the tailor] and his lady were invited to a party among their friends…while it devolved on me to stay at home and keep house. There was nothing left me in charge to do, only to take care of the house. There was a large cat that generally lay about the fire. In order to try my mechanical powers, I concluded to make a suit of clothing for puss, and for my purpose gathered some scraps of cloth that lay about the shop-board, and went to work as hard as I could. Late in the evening I got my suit of clothes finished; I caught the cat, put on the whole suit – coat, vest, and small-clothes [breeches] – buttoned all on tight, and set down my cat to inspect the fit.
"Unfortunately for me there was a hole through the floor close to the fireplace, just large enough for the cat to pass down; after making some efforts to get rid of the clothes, and failing, pussy descended through the hole and disappeared; the floor was tight and the house underpinned with brick, so there was no chance of pursuit. I consoled myself with a hope that the cat would extricate itself from its incumbrance, but not so; night came and I had made on a good fire and seated myself for some two or three hours after dark, when who should make their appearance but my master and mistress and two young men, all in good humor, with two or three bottles of rum. After all were seated around the fire, who should appear amongst us but the cat in his uniform. I was struck speechless, the secret was out and had no chance of concealing; the cat was caught, the whole work inspected and the question asked, is this your day’s work? I was obliged to answer in the affirmative; I would then have been willing to take a good whipping, and let it stop there, but no, to complete my mortification the clothes were carefully taken off the cat and hung up in the shop for the inspection of all customers that came in.”
A unique set of 14 daguerreotypes of the officers of the Franklin expedition, 1845
This remarkable set of three-quarter length daguerreotype portraits was made, en plein air, by the Beard Studio aboard Her Majesty’s Ship, the Erebus, on 15-17 May 1845, just three days before Sir John Franklin sailed on his legendary scientific voyage to the Northwest Passage, never to return.
Can't stop thinking about The Terror lately. Somehow this has resolved itself into making playlists for the Terror lieutenants.
They're hopeless. They're horrible. They're delightful. They're disasters. Sometimes they rise to an occasion. More usually, they slip flailingly beneath the merciless waves of fate and their own shortcomings. Or strengths that become shortcomings in the wrong situations. They try really, really hard.
It's not enough. It's never enough.
Anyway you can listen here--
Little
Irving
Hodgson
(I think I "get" Hodgson much less than the others. I think Little's and Irving's musical tastes would be earnest and [mostly] straightforward, but Hodgson is into all kinds of esoteric oddities, of which I am too square to be aware. So if his is too mainstream, I'm sorry.)
[ID: Three pictures of a small, robust bodied bird standing on leaf litter on the forest floor. It has a glossy black body and tail, chestnut colored wings, yellow legs, red eyes, and a red beak. End ID]
gracieabrams
germansingergirl
2087
yousharknotpass
titsay
blakekathryn
baratheonpilled
discoholicmusic
kianamaiart
