"That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history." - Aldous Huxley
This Week in History presents summaries of a few selected historical events for each calendar week of the year.
September 7 - America's first track auto race is won by an electric car (1896)
Five thousand spectators showed up on this day for a thrilling display of the latest transportation technology in America's first automobile race on a track, just like modern car races. Auto races had been held previously but as straightaways on roads rather than an oval track. NASCAR hadn't been born yet but its historical roots began on this day in 1896.
Held at the fairgrounds track of Narragansett Park in Providence, Rhode Island, ten vehicles were entered by their manufacturers to compete for the $900 prize in the Providence Horseless Carriage Race . Of those, only one would be familiar today: P.F. Olds & Son, which after several name and ownership changes ultimately became part of General Motors and its Oldsmobile division.
Scientific American magazine kept the nation informed about the marvelous achievements of the newfangled inventions. They commended the winning automobile, produced by the Riker Electric Motor Company, while sounding a bit skeptical of its future.
The electric carriage has made a record for speed, and the great ease of control and the absence of noise and odor will commend it to those who are anxious to purchase horseless carriages, but whether they are adapted for long runs or not still remain to be proved.
The
Riker Electric Trap used two electric motors on its rear axle for propulsion. The speed demon completed the 1 mile lap of the track in the then-astounding time of 2 minutes and 13 seconds. That works out to 27 miles per hour.
Providence Horseless Carriage Race of 1896 (click to embiggen)
Andrew Riker, despite the victorious speed feat of his electric machine, closed up shop in 1902 and went to work for a competitor, Locomobile, which produced steam-powered cars.
And now, 119 years later, the electric vehicle is once again all the rage, in the form of the Tesla.
Keep reading below the orange historical marker about more events during the second week of September.
September 9 - Happy birthday yet again, America? (1776)
Last week we toyed with the idea that the U.S.'s birthday might not be July 4, but September 3, when it became officially recognized as a new nation. But this history stuff is really confusing. Now we have another day as a candidate.
On this day in 1776, the new American Congress made its official views known as to what our new nation should be called:
Resolved, that in all Continental Commissions, and other Instruments where heretofore the Words, ‘United Colonies,’ have been used, the Stile be altered for the future to the United States.
Clearly the Congress realized that "United Colonies" was not only in popular use, but that it had appeared in early official documents of our country. Other popular terms during the initial phase of the Revolution included "United States", "Independent States", "American States", and a good deal of the time "Virginia", "Massachusetts", or the name of any other state in whose name and under whose flag soldiers were fighting.
Remember that at the time, no matter how annoyed they were with England, the individual colonies were still competitive with each other, distrustful of their neighbors, and jealously guarded their own prerogatives (thus we had the weak Articles of Ćonfederation for years before we adopted the Constitution). A good many people felt more patriotic about their particular state than about the new nation. In other words, it's much like it is now with some of our grumpier states who don't play well with others (I'm looking at you, Texas).
In Thomas Paine's book Common Sense, one of the literary forces that drove the revolution, he variously uses terms like "United Colonies", "independent states of America", and "American states." Not once does he ever string together the phrase "United States of America."
Click to embiggen
Sure, the Declaration of Independence has "united states" in the title. But if you look closely, it reads more like a descriptive adjective rather than a definitive name: the "united" is in tiny script next to the large "States of America" and it's not even capitalized. The whole phrase used is "the thirteen united States of America." Later in our founding document, Jefferson writes "United Colonies" so it seems pretty shaky to claim he had the good ol' "USA" in mind the whole time.
It would have been awkward to keep fumbling our own name, varying it whimsically whenever and wherever we spoke or wrote. A definitive choice needed to be made and thus Congress acted. Perhaps the congressional resolution above not only formally named our country but originated the saying that "it takes an act of Congress" to get something done.
So, there was no actual government or nation officially named "The United States of America" until this day in 1776. From July 4 to September 9, we were sort of like Prince, the rock star who became TAFKAP (The Artist Formerly Known As Prince): we were TFLCNIRWMBKBSN (Those Formerly Loyal Colonies Now In Rebellion Who May Be Known By Sundry Names).
Of course, these muddy waters of history can get even murkier if we stir them up a bit. Article I of the Articles of Confederation states "The style of this confederacy shall be 'The United States of America.'" They only came into force as the governing law of the nation when they were ratified in March of 1781. So up until that moment, Congress had really been acting as a sort of provisional ad hoc government. It could be argued that Congress' September 9, 1776 adoption of our country's name had no real legitimacy.
So, when did the U.S. of A. spring forth into existence? The day we spurned our former liege, the day other nations accepted our legitimacy, or the day we adopted our official name? I suggest we think of September 9 as our christening day instead of our birthday.
Just be glad that Texas wasn't an original colony or they might have gotten us named Murica.
September 10 - Demon rum takes the driver's seat (1897)
Well, that didn't take long. The first gasoline-powered motor car, the prototype for our modern automobiles, was invented in 1886. When gas, steam, and electric horseless carriages came onto the market, they were expensive indulgences. One would think that the owners would be cautious with their valuable possessions. One would be wrong.
Just eleven years later, when cars were still a rare commodity, the world witnessed what would soon become commonplace on highways and byways everywhere: the first arrest for drunk driving.
On this day in 1897 in England, George Smith crashed his London taxicab into a building. Fortunately for the police officers on the scene, Smith admitted that he was drunk so they didn't need to prove what was obvious to them by his behavior. Automotive technology had been growing by leaps and bounds; law enforcement technology, not so much.
Soon the race was on. Not auto racing but the race to find a practical and legally-binding method to prove intoxication. In 1910, New York passed the first state law forbidding operation of a vehicle while drunk but enforcement was stymied with "he said/he said" arguments before a judge to determine if the accused really had been under the influence.
Breathalyzer
Blood and urine tests were possible but not practical since they involved transporting the accused to a doctor or laboratory, often in the middle of the night. It wasn't until 1931 that a somewhat practical device came into use: the
Drunkometer. The suspected driver blew into a balloon, the air was released into a tube, some chemical reactions took place, and the blood alcohol level could be calculated. It was still cumbersome and inexact in reading the results, but at least it was fast, semi-portable, and didn't require the services of medical professionals.
Based on studies by the National Safety Council in the 1930s, most states adopted a blood alcohol content of 0.15% as the level legally presumed to be inebriated. In the 1970s, many states began to lower it to 0.10% and then to 0.08%, the standard urged by the federal government.
Fifty-seven years after George Smith's arrest, inebriated drivers faced a new enemy: the Breathalyzer. Introduced in 1954, it was fully portable so tests could be done on the spot. Moreover, it automated the whole process of analyzing the breath, removing the officer-interpreted results from the equation. Now a suspected drunk driver would have to argue against a machine, a challenge with slim chances of victory. Yet it still hasn't had the salubrious effect of deterring millions of drivers from tossing back another beer or martini as "one for the road."
September 12 - The world's most magnificent prehistoric art gallery (1940)
On this day in 1940, four French teenagers entered a long-lost cave near the picturesque village of Montignac in southwestern France. One of the boys, Marcel Ravidat, had discovered the entrance earlier while chasing his errant dog. He returned with his friends and they explored the 66-foot wide cavern. They beheld striking representations of animals painted on the cave walls.
Scientists and researchers soon flocked to the site, now known as the Lascaux Caves. Investigating side-caverns of the complex as well as the main grotto, they have catalogued nearly 2,000 images dating back to approximately 17,000 years ago. Most of the drawings are of animals, along with some abstract designs and just one human figure: a man with an erect phallus and the head of a bird.
Click to embiggen
One oddity of Lascaux is that there are no representations of reindeer, the most common food source for the primitive artists. Bulls, horses, aurochs (wild oxen) and stags are depicted in abundance, with one 17-foot long bull being the largest animal yet discovered in prehistoric art anywhere.
The public was able to view the caverns from 1948 until 1963, when tests revealed that the effects of visitors, such as humidity and carbon dioxide, were damaging the artwork. A replica of the most popular areas of the cave complex was opened in 1983 so that tourists could still enjoy the experience while keeping the original galleries safe. The re-created visitor's center includes the Great Hall of the Bulls and the Painted Gallery.
Lascaux was added as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1979.
And that's the news for this week in history. Goodnight, and have a pleasant tomorrow.