Entries Tagged 'People' ↓

Honolulu advices contain a copy of a letter sent by U. S. Minister Willis to the Hawaiian government, demand that reparation be made James Durel, an alleged American citizen, of Negro and Indian blood, who was arrested last January and charged with treason. In refutation of the demand the Hawaiian government will prove that Durel aided the queen; that he furthered the conspiracy to reseat the queen, and that his demand of $25,000 is exhorbitant. Hawaii is viewing this action of Minister Willis with serious apprehension. They fear that it indicates active hostility toward them on the part of the American administration, and that it is designed to encourage and lead the way to a series of similar demands from Great Britain, and perhaps other powers, which would be ruinous to Hawaii to comply with.

[tags]Ann Arbor Register, August, 1895[/tags]

A case of insanity of a curious sort is just now exciting considerable interest among the medial fraternity of London, says an exchange. A negro was found the other day in a gentleman’s house at Willesden and could give no account of himself because of severe fits of laughter which convulsed his frame. He was taken to the nearest workhouse and ever since has done nothing but laugh.

He has not uttered a word in the interval, and what is his name or where he came from is unknown. He laughs continuously from morning till night and at meal times he swallows his food like lightning in order, apparently, that he may continue his fit of mirth with as little interruption as possible. When he goes to sleep his sides shake with laughter, and in the morning the moment he opens his eyes his capacious mouth opens, too, with a loud guffaw.

At first it was thought he had adopted this means to escape from being tried on the charge of attempted burglary, but the physicians who have examined him unite in pronouncing him insane, and say that his cure is doubtful. The chances are, it seems, that he will literally laugh himself to death.

This form of insanity, though rare, is not unknown to medial science, though the mania is generally of a transitory nature. There are several cases on record of grave personages, who had rarely been seen to smile, suddenly breaking into a habit of uncontrollable and contagious laughter. Dr. Clouston tells of a solid, prudent business man who one day startled his family by a fit of laughter which lasted so long and was so hilarious that every one in the room had to join in.

From time to time after that he would be seized in the church, in the train or in the streets, and whenever he started all who heard him would have to follow. It was the first symptoms of mania. Very soon delusions and the most outrageous conduct supervened and then–the asylum.

[tags]Ann Arbor Register, March, 1896[/tags]

A French archaeologist, traveling among the Andes in search of knowledge and specimens, had a great desire to explore some of the caves in the sides of the precipices. They were doubtless ancient tombs and would probably yield him a treasure. He selected a favorable spot therefore, rigged a sort of chair or seat between two leather cords, and engaged two Indians to let him down from the brow of the precipice. “A descent of 300 feet made in this way,” he tells us, “is extraordinarily long.” However, he reached the cave in safety, and on forcing a passage into it was rewarded by finding two skulls and a mummy–”thoroughly dry,” he says, “and pretty solid.” He passed a string through the eyeholes of the skulls and attached them to his belt. Then he took the mummy in his arms and signaled to the Indians to draw him up. With his heels he defended himself against the jutting rocks and in a few minutes was almost on a level with the top. The Indians knew nothing about his load. Just then the yellow skull of one of their ancestors appeared before their eyes and the idiots gave a start of surprise. The Frenchman thought they must have let go the cord.

“It was the affair of a second,” he writes. “What passes in the brain of a man at such an instant is indescribable. I did not drop a yard, but I experienced all the horror of a man in rapidly falling through space. My hands let go the mummy, and while covered with a cold sweat, I was helped over the edge of the cliff by the Indians the mummy bounded from rock to rock and landed in bits at the bottom of the chasm.”

He overwhelmed the Indians with invectives, but to no purpose. Such dead men, they assured him, if disturbed in their sepulchers, had the habit of kissing the Indians, who perished infallibly under their deadly breath. One of the two declared that his own father had died in that way. The other assured the Frenchman that at the moment when the head of the mummy showed above the edge of the rocks it opened its mouth. If it had not luckily fallen into the abyss it would have cursed them forever.

[tags]Ann Arbor Register, July, 1895[/tags]

Weston, the pedestrian, on his walk from Portland (Me.) to Chicago, a distance of 1,237½ miles, is “marching on” with a good prospect of success. He arrived at Syracuse (N. Y.) from Oneida, a distance of 28 miles, about nine o’clock on Monday morning. He says he is now 18 hours ahead of time. We have before published the conditions upon which Mr. Weston attempts this almost unheard-of feat, but the following brief resume of them will not prove uninteresting. He is to walk 100 miles in twenty-four hours during his journey, and has the privilege of trying five times to do it. He has made one attempt, starting from Dedham (Mass.) in which he failed, owing to injuries received from the crowd at Pawtucket. He will try again after leaving Buffalo. If he does not succeed in any of these attempts, he forfeits six-tenths of the stake, whether he walks the 1,237½ miles in twenty-six days or not. Six men in carriages accompany him to see that all is fairly done. The stake is $10,000, and he is confident of winning. Edward Payson Weston is twenty-seven years of age, five feet seven and a half inches high, and weighs 125 pounds. His walking dress, is a jacket, tight-fitting black pantaloons, stout brogans, with red tops, round top hat, and buff gloves. He is a canvasser by profession, and is to distribute on the road 30,000 copies of his little paper, The Time Table.

[tags]Peninsular Courier and Family Visitant, November, 1867[/tags]

A horrible story has just been brought to light at Owasso in which a woman named Nellie Hayes is charged with cremating her new born babe, Mrs. Abram Truax at whose house the woman was stopping, being the informer. She says that the Hayes woman was taken sick at her house last May, when birth was given to a child which she deliberately threw into the cook stove and watched it burn. She gives as her reason for not divulging it sooner that her husband, who was father to the babe, threatened her life if she did so. An investigation is being made. The Hayes woman is now serving a term in the Detroit house of correction. She denies the crime.

[tags]Ann Arbor Register, August, 1895[/tags]

The lecture delivered by Prof. W. B. Stickney, of Ann Arbor, at the library building last evening, under the auspices of the Columbian club, was listened to with deep interest by a good-sized audience. “Nicola Tesla and Recent Marvelous Discoveries in Electricity and Ether” was the subject, and it was handled in an able manner by the speaker, who is an ardent admirer and strong champion of the Servian whose startling electrical discoveries have opened up a new era in the world of science. Although Nicola Tesla is by 37 years of age he has fathomed many of the hidden mysteries of electricity and is the patentee of 127 inventions along this line. Prof. Stickney suggested that the world was upon the eve of even greater discoveries in electricity and ether, the latter of which he denominated as the store-house of energy, and ventured the prediction that in five years from now the world would stand face to face with materialized forces of which it does not now even dream.–Flint Daily News.

[tags]Ann Arbor Register, September, 1895[/tags]

The Free Press, in speaking of this magnificent display, said, “The stage set was the most elaborate affair of the times ever seen here. The large choruses were well trained; the principals were as effective as possible, the speciality performers were above the average, and altogether the performance was the most extensive entertainment imaginable, both in the diversity of its features and in the dimension of the stage. It is impossible to enumerate all its features. The sight was of a dazzling nature, when the entertainment was at its height. It is needless to mention the various set features but they were marvels of delight to the 6,000 or so people assembled and the “oh’s” and “ah’s” became a general murmur of admiration and pleasure. Certainly the effect was startling in the extreme, and nothing stronger or more sensational could have been devised.” The Tribune, in speaking of the performance, said, “Lalla Rookh is as brilliant as a butterfly’s wings. Fully 10,000 people visited the spectacle last night. To attempt to describe the brilliant setting would be about as profitable as to endeavor to catalogue the colors of a butterfly’s wings or to write and essay on a half dozen rainbows. The fact is, “Lalla Rookh is one those spectacles not to be adequately described at any treat length unless one desires to become ridiculous.” The News characterized it as a “splendid show, witnessed by many thousand people,” and estimated the attendance at 10,000, with as many more on the outside of the enclosure. It said in a sub-headline that the special features formed “a good vaudeville show.” In closing a description of the show the New said, “The show was over at 10:50 o’clock and everybody went home voting it a great success.” Performances are to be given every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday night until August 10, with a grand gala night.

[tags]Ann Arbor Register, August, 1895[/tags]

The story of “Lalla Rookh,” as told in the delightfully romantic poem of the Orient by Tom Moore, will be exploited in the pyrotechnic carnival which is to celebrate the opening of The Detroit Railway lines at Boulevard Park, 14th Avenue and the Boulevard, Detrot, beginning Tuesday, July 23. Lalla Rookh, as the readers of Tom Moore will remember, was the daughter of the powerful Arungzebe. As the time in which the story opens she was betrothed to the youthful king of Lesser Bucharia. The king had fallen in love with the heroine while visiting at her father’s court, where he was entertained in a style of magnificent hospitality. The young king goes back to his home and Lalla Rookh is to follow him. The day of her departure from Delhi was a day of the most gorgeous celebration and it is here that the story of the pyrospectacle opens. Setting forth from Delhi, in magnificently equipped barges and surrounded by the flotilla upon the Jumna, the action of the piece opens in a blaze of light. Upon the waters of the lake, which has been constructed at the park, the flotilla will set sail, attended by the feast of the roses, and Oriental custom of much beauty. The lake has been so prepared that it will represent, as correctly as may be, all the aisles and shores of the Persian Gulf and standing out in bold relief in the background will be the temples and alters of the fire worshippers. Volcanos in full eruption will illuminate the far distance. Each step in Moore’s story up to the time she meets the unknown Casmerean poet and is enchanted will be followed as told in the romance. Her desire to flee the court with the poet rather than marry the king is the climax of dramatic action. Into the story are introduced the tragic elements which Moore so graphically told and the happy denouement when the princess recognizes in the king the poet to whom her first maiden’s love has been given. With such a story, environed by all the wealth of gorgeous pyrotechnic display that the great master, Pain, is capable of, will the visitors to Boulevard Park be entertained on the carnival nights of The Detroit Railway. Already the amphitheatre approaches completion, the vast stage is ready for its twelve tons of scenery, the great lake has been flooded and the chorus and accessories numbering some three hundred people, are in training. Hundreds of workmen have been busy for weeks completing the double track line which The Detroit Railway has built to its park and by July 20 the last stroke of preparation will have been made and the pyro-spectacle ready for its guests. Parties intending to visit Boulevard Park and desiring seats in any particular portion of the grand stand will do well to notify Manager G. E. Raymond, 719 Chamber of Commerce Building, of their intention, that he may reserve accommodations for them. The first performance will be given July 23 and repeated every Thursday and Saturday night thereafter until August 10, with a grand special performance August 7.

[tags]Ann Arbor Register, July, 1895[/tags]