It Was a Victorian Thing: Get Me Out of Here (I’m Not Dead Yet!) – Part I
Merriam-Webster defines fear as “an unpleasant often strong emotion caused by anticipation of awareness of danger.”1 When fear becomes exaggerated, inexplicable and illogical it escalates to the level of phobia. While it isn’t uncommon for human beings to fear death, Victorians had a decidedly good reason for a heightened sense of dread in regards to life’s inevitable conclusion.
A September 20, 1963 article in LIFE magazine suggested this peculiar phobia was perhaps inspired by the nineteenth century master of creepy stories, Edgar Allan Poe.2 Indeed, stories like “The Premature Burial” or “The Fall of the House of Usher” were themed with heightened paranoia.
In a time before embalming became standard practice the fear of being buried alive (taphephobia) seems to have been palpable. Why else would there be a need for “safety coffins” or “grave signals”? Was it rational? If so, why? Victorians began to address this particular dread via invention, but the fear of being buried alive had been around for quite sometime.
Some of the earliest newspaper accounts were published before the mid-eighteenth century:
A Milkwoman’s Daughter at Endfield was lately buried alive there. When she was going to be interr’d, some People at the Funeral, thought she looked fresh, and taking a Lookingglass, and applying it to her Lips, they fancied they perceived a Dew on it as from Breath; but the cruel Mother mock’d and reviled them, and swore she should be buried, and so she was; but this coming to the Ears of a near relation, he got the Grave dug up, and the Coffin open’d, when she was found with her Knees drawn up, and the Nosegay in her hand bitten to pieces, struggling for Life. A Surgeon was sent for to bleed her, but it was then too late.3
John Frohock, Esq., Counsellor at Law, who died last Week at Ipswich in Suffolk, having always had a terrible Apprehension of being buried alive, has ordered by his Will, that the Lid of the Coffin in which he is to be put, shall be made with Hinges to open easily; and that four Persons be appointed continually to attend his Corpse, not only before ‘tis bury’d, but for eight Days after Interrment in his Vault; in which time, if he should happen to come to Life, he intends to rap against the Coffin Lid, and his Attendants are in such case to furnish their proper Assistance.4
The story of someone almost being buried alive appeared in a Maryland newspaper in 1754:
Dublin, August 31. We have an Account from Cork, that a Gentlewoman swooned away, and to all Appearance seemed to be quite dead, insomuch that she was washed and stretched; but some Time after a Sprig of Holly, which had been hung up in the Room directly over where she lay, happening to fall upon her Face, brought her to Life. It is said, her Husband pays great Adoration to this Holly Bush, as the sole Means of preventing his Wife from being buried alive.5
A series of examples subsequently appeared in newspapers, some suggesting more time should be allowed before officially pronouncing some completely dead. Via the South-Carolina Gazette in 1755:
If you are of Opinion, that this Letter can in any Shape benefit Mankind, you will be pleased to publish it in the Gazette. It is intended to prevent the too precipitate Interments of the Dead. The Intention is laudable, however unequal I may be for the Subject, which is of Important enough to claim universal Attention. Men may flatter themselves, that they never shall have the Plague, Small-Pox, or any other particular Disease, and thereforce regard with Indifference those Writings that treat of them; but none are ignorant, that Death is inevitable to all, none need to be taught that Life is desirable, or to have it proved, that being buried alive is the greatest Misfortune to which human Nature can be subject.6
The correspondent included some examples from history which he hoped would “be sufficient to put all Persons on their Guard.” Romans kept their dead seven days before incinerating them. Might one pause to wonder whether the mid-eighteenth century practice of burying the dead within 24 hours should be questioned with one historical example of someone revived after lying under water for 16 hours? One man had (allegedly) lived to be 77 after being under water for seven weeks at the age of 17!
In 1768 one woman desired her death to be unquestioned:
A Lady in Holborn [a London district] made her Will a few Days ago, in which she left 50l. to her Surgeon, on Condition that he cuts her Throat as soon as she has been dead 12 hours; the Fear of being buried alive has occasioned this Legacy.7
An Englishman in the early nineteenth century proposed a rather unique (and sensual) way to ensure he wasn’t buried alive:
Mr. Fransham, of Norwich, who died lately, was so apprehensive of being buried alive, that repeatedly and earnestly before his decease, he requested that his body should be laid before a fire, that wine should be offered to his lips, and the arms of a young woman clasped round his neck, before he was given up as irrecoverable.8
A helpful suggestion for undertakers?
Undertakers should never neglect to ascertain, by plunging a knife into part of a corpse, whether life is extinct. This practice would prevent the horrible fear of being buried alive.9
Numerous references of “buried alive” or “coffined alive” can be found in nineteenth century newspapers. During epidemics of diseases such as cholera or yellow fever these types of stories would appear, a reminder yet again that one of life’s greatest fears wasn’t death itself, but the fear of being buried alive. Newspapers began providing detailed accounts, some quite horrifying and sounding like fiction.
BURIED ALIVE – ALMOST, NOT QUITE. The New Orleans Picayune says – A scene strange as any founded on fiction occurred in this city on Sunday last. We will give it in the words of the gentleman who furnished us with the fact. His veracity and its truth may be relied on.
It appears that a young Spaniard was lying in the last stages of yellow fever, next door to the printing office of Mr. G., in Chartres street. The physician, Dr. B., was sent for, but before his arrival, the young man had ceased to live, according to the opinions of those in the house, so that when he arrived he found his patient covered with a white linen, and reported as dead.
That very evening they washed and cleansed the young man, and having put on his burial dress, they laid him on his bed until the morning. In the morning a coffin was got, and all the necessary preparations were made. He was then taken and put into his coffin, but no sooner was he dropped in it than he jumped up and asked where they were going to place him. They then conducted him in a carriage to a colored nurse woman’s house. He is yet very sick, but may perhaps live. It appears that he was in a state of lethargy.10
This incident apparently drove a man’s sister into a sort of catatonic state:
COFFINED ALIVE
Supposed Death of a Young Man of
Forest, Ohio – He Recovers and His
Sister Loses Her Reason
In January 1877 twenty-two year-old Charles Hueston “with a disease supposed be a congestion of the lungs” was pronounced dead after remaining unconscious for approximately two hours. Of course, his family was devastated as they hadn’t arrived in time to see him before his untimely death.
Charles’ body was laid out to begin preparations for burial. While the barber was shaving the corpse the razor slipped and brought forth “a jet of deep colored blood”. Some bystanders proposed that perhaps he wasn’t dead after all, “but little heed was paid to these speculations”.
Preparations continued as he was dressed and placed in the coffin, “but as a precautionary measure the lid was not screwed down.”
The coffin was placed on a passenger train, accompanied by his family. His sister, however, determined to remain with his coffin while her parents rode in the passenger coach. About an hour from their destination “a loud, unearthly shriek was heard, and in a second the young girl was prostrate upon the floor in a swoon.”
Several people rushed to the scene and were also “nearly paralyzed” by what they witnessed. “The supposed corpse of Charles Hueston was living, moving, breathing. The head was thrust above the coffin, and the face, with its deathly pallor, presented a weird and ghastly spectacle. The young man was evidently amazed at his surroundings, and the first returning gleams of consciousness found him in a position of bewilderment. Loving hands and kind hearts devoted themselves to the care of the man who had, as it were, so suddenly risen from the dead, and of the young girl who so suddenly had been brought to the very portals of the grave.”
Charles was expected to fully recover, but his sister had “not had one moment of consciousness since the wild shriek which she gave in the car at the dreadful spectacle which met her eyes. It is feared, indeed, that her reason is permanent dethroned.”11
The most disturbing stories, of course, were instances of a coffin being opened after someone either heard a noise (and ignored it) or a family member fearing their loved one had been mistakenly buried alive, only to find evidence of an escape attempt.
In 1877 a man who had gone to California for his health had died and was being shipped back East in a metallic coffin. In Ogden, Utah the corpse was signed over to the care of express messenger Frank Burgess. In western Nebraska Burgess heard sounds coming from the coffin, leading him to believe the dead man had come back to life.
Again the noise was heard, and the attention of the messenger was riveted to the coffin, and the horrible possibility that the dead might be alive thrust itself upon the messenger so forcibly that he called the attention of other employees to it, but, after listening a moment, they merely laughed at him. The convictions of the express messenger, however, were so strong that he had heard moans from the coffin that he had the case opened when the train made its next halt. The weather was very cold, and upon the inside of the glass plate of the coffin there had accumulated a thin film of frost, such as might have been deposited by the breath of a person confined in such narrow quarters. The face was also drawn up against the glass plate, and other disturbances indicated life. While Burgess had no doubt the man, though dead then, had been alive in the coffin, the other employees explained an accumulation of frost on the glasses the natural exhalations of the dead body, and the disturbances of the corpse as due to the movements in shipping.
Once the coffin arrived at its destination it was opened, revealing “unmistakable proofs of the terrible truth”. The now for-certain deceased man’s “hands were clinched, the lips bitten, and the mouth filled with bloody froth.”12
Stop by next week for Part 2. Necessity being the mother of invention, a number of innovative devices were conceived. One of the hallmarks of the 1800s – the “century of acceleration” – was an explosion of innovation, invention and medical advancements. Faced with challenges, Victorians sought ways to circumvent them, although some of their inventions were more than a bit ill-conceived. Such was the case with devices like safety coffins, life detectors and grave signals.
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Footnotes:
It Was a Victorian Thing: Memento Mori
Today it might sound creepy, but post-mortem pictures were not uncommon, especially during the Victorian era. I’m not talking about taking pictures of the dearly departed in their casket – that is practiced even today as a way to have closure when a loved one passes. The term used for the practice is “memento mori”, which in Latin means “remember death.”
If you’ve seen pictures taken in the 1800s that looked at little “odd” or “stiff”, chances are the picture was taken after the person had passed away. We have to remember, too, that photography in the 1800’s was very (very) different than the instant world we live in today.
Before 1839, only people who were well-off enough to afford it had their portraits painted. Following the invention of the daguerreotype in 1839, more people could afford a photograph, although taking the photograph was hardly a “snap” in those days. Because of the longer exposure times required in the early days of photography, subjects would have to remain still for several minutes to ensure a blur-free photograph.
Sitting still might be less of a problem for adults, but imagine requiring a squirmy child to sit still for up to thirty minutes. Photographers in the nineteenth century often employed the use of stands or tables for their subjects to lean against. One device called a “Brady stand” was made of cast iron and height-adjustable.
Another device called a “posing stand” could be employed to provide even more stability to the 
subject (dead or alive) allowing them to stand for extended periods of time. This particular device was also height-adjustable and provided bracing in both the neck and back areas. Just something to think about the next time you look through a bunch of old pictures of your ancestors – and remember NOTHING was as easy and quick as it is today.
Several years ago, I ran across an interesting article at Answers.com and the pictures posted below were part of the article, although I’m uncertain as to where they originated. They are quite interesting, providing insight into the techniques employed by these photographers and instilling an appreciation (even awe) for their skills (and patience!). These types of photographs, of course, are not likely to be taken these days, but I found the history behind them fascinating.
Like me, you may be thinking of taking a closer look at some of those old family pictures!
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Footnotes:
Of Collar and Corset: Saved by His Collar
Last week it was “Killed by His Collar”. Conversely, celluloid collars were known to have saved more than a few fashionable man. Just another example of “It Was a Victorian Thing”.
SAVED BY HIS COLLAR: One of Those Derided Celluloid Affairs Proves a Friend in Need
A celluloid collar was perhaps the means of saving Thomas Randall’s life on Monday night. Randal is a peaceable-looking Canuck who was sitting at a table in George W. Rich’s saloon, No. 114 Main Street, reading a paper early that evening when a laborer on the dock named Daniel McNerney, as the police report, came up and sat down. McNerney had been drinking freely and began cursing at Randall. The latter remonstrated and McNerney drew out a pocket-knife and made a plunge at Randall. The side of the blow caught Randall in the neck, but its force was spent in passing through the celluloid collar.13
SAVED BY HIS COLLAR
How Mary Twopence Shot Her Husband, a Barber, at Orange
Mrs. Mary Twopence of Orange, N.J., is in the County Jail for shooting her husband in the neck, says the New York Advertiser. Mr. Twopence is a barber, and has his shop on Dodd Street. The Twopences are colored. They have frequently quarreled. Mr. Twopence returned home yesterday afternoon at 5 o’clock. He and his wife had their usual quarrel. He threatened to cut her heart out, and she said she would chill his blood.
The family ax was in the yard. It had a razor edge. Mr. Twopence rushed out into the yard, seized the ax, and, the wife says, shouted to her: “You black devil, I’ll cut you deep!”
“You can’t scare me, honey,” screamed his wife, who hurried upstairs and grabbed up a 32-caliber revolver, which they kept in the bed-room. Husband and wife met at the foot of the stairs. Twopence raised his ax. As the gleaming blade was poised aloft Mrs. Twopence pointed the revolver at her husband. He dodged, turning his face away.
The next moment the woman fired. The bullet struck Twopence’s collar, which was very stiff, and, glancing off, imbedded itself in the fleshy part of his neck.
“Don’t shoot any more! I’se got enough!” yelled the barber.
“I’se done you, sho’ ‘nuff, nigger dis time,” said Mrs. Twopence.
Neighbors at this moment rushed in and Mrs. Twopence was arrested. Dr. Chambers took the bullet from Twopence’s neck, and said the collar saved his life.14
What was it about stiff celluloid collars with potential to shield or horrifically act as a type of “heretic’s fork” (a gruesome invention of the Inquisition to torture suspected witches and heretics)?
Celluloid: Functional or Deadly?
In 1862 Englishman Alexander Parkes, a prolific inventor, developed the world’s first plastic material, dubbing it “Parkesine”. As a self-taught expert chemist and metallurgist, Parkes had invented and patented a number of innovative processes and materials. In 1850 Parkes “secured a patent for a self-acting calcining furnace, and also a method of extracting silver from metallic lead by means of zinc, a method known as Parkes’ zinc desilverising process.”15
Thereafter, Parkes directed his ingenuity toward discovering a substitute for “ivory, pearl, amber, indiarubber, guttapercha, &c.” On October 22, 1855 he secured a patent for “using compounds of nitro cellulose with camphor, gums, resin, oils, and solvents.” He called it “Parkesine”.16
In America John Wesley Hyatt obtained Parkes’ patent (later challenged in court unsuccessfully) and U.S. Patent No. 105,338, dated July 12, 1870, was issued to John W. Hyatt, Jr. and Isaiah S. Hyatt (brother). By experimenting with Parkesine Hyatt developed a material, quite by accident, which came to be known as celluloid.
One of Hyatt’s first inventions was a substitute for ivory in billiard balls developed in 1869, a combination of paper flock, shellac and collodion [used in early photographic processing to coat and produce a photographic plate]. An accidentally-overturned bottle of collodion sparked an idea as he observed the substance solidifying. The discovery would come to be both blessing and curse, the difference between life and death, as evidenced by articles cited above.
In 1870 Hyatt established the Albany Dental Plate Company, producing false teeth, piano keys and billiard balls utilizing celluloid, followed by the Celluloid Manufacturing Company in 1872 (moved the following year to Newark, New Jersey). Hyatt had already discovered a number of ways to use celluloid, even as other businesses like the Celluloid Brush Company and the Celluloid Novelty Company were opening their doors around the same time.
One of the first uses for celluloid was false teeth. In 1874 Hyatt, as Secretary of the Celluloid Manufacturing Company, spoke at the New Orleans Dental College to about fifty of the city’s dentists. He demonstrated by molding two sets of teeth, explaining how easily the substance could be manipulated. It was an excellent base for artificial teeth, far superior to rubber and aesthetically pleasing. Hyatt urged “general adoption” of celluloid.17
The use of celluloid in the manufacture of false teeth, billiard balls and piano keys was, of course, related to what the Smithsonian called “the ivory problem”.18 Even though not exactly factual, concerns arose over the possibility of ivory supplies being depleted, at a time when the sport of billiards was rising in popularity. In response an American billiard company, Phelan and Collender, offered a $10,000 reward to anyone who could invent a material to replace ivory.
Parkes’ Parkesine came close, but Hyatt’s development of celluloid was easier to produce on a commercial level. The problem with celluloid, however, was its flammability. Hyatt was well aware of the problem, and not at all surprising, since the main components of celluloid were nitrocellulose, flash paper and gun cotton. How much more dangerous could this substance be?
Not long after the Celluloid Manufacturing Company was founded, fire broke out and destroyed part of the Albany plant. In September 1875 a far more serious incident occurred at the Newark facility.
TERRIBLE EXPLOSION AT NEWARK
A Celluloid Factory Blown Up
Large Loss of Life and Property – Number of the Killed Uncertain – Several Persons Believed to be Buried in the Ruins – One Dead Body Taken Out – Thirteen Persons Badly Wounded – The Accident Caused by Overheating Celluloid.
A fire was discovered about 6 o’clock last evening in the drying room on the second floor of the building of the Celluloid Manufacturing Company in Newark. . . Charles Burrows, the foreman of the drying room, in which the fire broke out, immediately turned on the steam, with the purpose of extinguishing the fire, but he had hardly done so and reached the door, when there was a terrible explosion, caused by the overheating of a quantity of celluloid in process of manufacture.19
The New York Times wondered whether the public should be wary of this new substance which might suddenly explode in someplace other than a manufactory plant?
EXPLOSIVE TEETH
The recent explosion in Newark has made many people aware, for the first time, of the existence of celluloid. That pleasing compound, which presents itself to the ordinary eye in the guise of a white substance somewhat resembling ivory, is said to be composed of gun-cotton, camphor, and a number of other articles which even the most sanguine and visionary elephant would never dream of attempting to convert into ivory. . .
Now that a celluloid factory has blown up, it is a matter of a good deal of interest to persons possessed of celluloid hairbrushes and billiard-balls to know whether those article will explode. The hair-brush is a favorite tool of ladies who desire to drive nails into the wall, and who cannot remember where they last laid away the hammer; but surely a hair-brush which is liable to explode on sharply striking a nail, and to blow the fair hammerer out of the window, is to be regarded with grave suspicion. No man can play billiards with any real satisfaction, if he knows that the billiard-balls may at any moment explode in a series of three closely-connected explosions, thereby spoiling a promising run, and burying the players under the wreck of table and cues. Still worse would be the fate of a possessor of a set of celluloid teeth who should, in a moment of forgetfulness, insert the lighted end of his cigar into his mouth. The scene that would follow would make men and angels weep…
It is only fulfilling a charitable duty to inform the possessors of celluloid teeth and brushes that they are safe from the danger of actual explosion. Nevertheless, it is asserted that celluloid will take fire with the utmost case, and, having taken fire, will burn with great rapidity, giving off meanwhile a highly flammable gas. If you bring your celluloid hair-brush in contact with the gas-light, it will only be necessary to drop it promptly in the water-jug and rush out into the open air. If you set your celluloid teeth on fire, the Fire Department should be instantly summoned, and in the meantime the mouth and nostrils should be hermetically sealed, as are the hatchways of a burning ship – for the double purpose of keeping out the air and keeping in the inflammable gas. If these precautionary measures are kept in mind, it may be quite possible to use celluloid brushes and billiard-balls and teeth without any very great danger. At any rate, it is a comfort to know that celluloid will not explode, and that a man can go to bed with a serene confidence that his teeth will not go off in the middle of the night with a tremendous concussion, and without even giving the knowledge – held by most people to be so thoroughly satisfactory – of what it was that killed him.20
The Times wasn’t alone in its concerns since products made of celluloid continued to be manufactured and sold to public which may or may not have been aware of the potential dangers – “in total ignorance of the fact that they grind with celluloid with they masticate their food, that they punch celluloid with a cue when they rattle festive balls, and that celluloid is [explosive] . . . Cigar smokers and benzine consumers had better take notice because a fire engine is not always handy, and it would be unpleasant, to say the least of it, to have the top of one’s head burned off, or a friend reduced to ashes from the action of an ignited billiard-ball.”21
Advertisements for celluloid teeth appeared in newspapers around the country. “Some demented dentist” was perfecting a “diabolical invention” – false teeth made of celluloid. Claims of billiard balls igniting, breastpins going off, “leaving their wearers on their backs in convulsions”.
Did anyone really want to be on edge wondering whether “his incisors or bicuspids” might explode at a dinner party. It was one thing if a collar or knife handle combusted and quite another if a set of false of teeth exploded:
If they explode it only befalls that one’s ears are blown off or his fingers dispersed about the dining-room, but in the case of an appendage so intimate as a set of teeth a like occurrence would leave the wearer no organs wherewith to curse the inventor.22
A grand announcement was made in 1890 as the Celluloid Manufacturing Company, the Celluloid Brush Company and the Celluloid Novelty Company joined forces with a goal of creating a new “celluloid combination”. Camphor had become prohibitively expensive and it was, of course, highly flammable. The new partnership would focus on manufacturing “a new incombustible plastic material”.23
Unfortunately, it was a problem which was never solved as stories continued to appear in newspapers around the country for several years, even into the early twentieth century:
- In 1886 a three-year old child was holding a celluloid comb when it came into contact with a gas flame, immediately exploding, melting and sending “flaming matter running over the child’s face, shoulders and arms.”24
- A Celluloid Comb Exploded. A young woman in Edinburg, Indiana was severely burned when the celluloid comb she was wearing in her hair exploded after “holding her head too near a fire.”25
- Exploding celluloid spread flames which gutted a five-story building in New York City in 1901. The building housed several businesses, one of them being a “perfumery establishment”. The smell of “ordinary smoke was nothing by comparison to that laden with the sickening smell of musk or even of high-priced colognes.”26
- A “little device utilized by women to hold up their lace collars – a piece of celluloid about two inches long and a quarter of an inch wide, worth 5 cents the half dozen – cost the United States Laundry Company a fire loss of $90,000 and imperiled 200 laundry workers” in Portland, Oregon in 1910. The collar had been tucked away in another garment and hung in the drying room with hundreds of garments. When hung close to heated pipes which lined the room the little piece of celluloid exploded “and instantly the room was aflame.”27
- A Rock Island, Illinois police officer was near death after he used kerosene to start a fire. His clothes caught on fire and then his celluloid collar exploded, severely burning his neck and shoulders.28
- In 1920 a man was willing to let his barber “give him the works” as long as he didn’t have to take off his collar. The barber essayed a single. Whoof! An explosion. The collar was celluloid.”29
Despite these disturbing stories, collars, combs, and even children’s toys, continued to explode and cause harm. In 1924, Mrs. Robert Cartwright of Brooklyn demanded action, asking that all products made of celluloid be prominently labeled as “combustible” in order to protect the public. Another woman had recently received severe burns from “exploding celluloid water wave curlers”.30
By mid-twentieth century celluloid was being replaced by synthetic polymers. Today, celluloid objects are collector’s items which should, of course, be handled with great care. As the Vintage Celluloid Collectibles web site points out:
Proper handling of Celluloid items are very important considering its extreme flammability. Keep Celluloid items in a well ventilated room. Do not store Celluloid in tightly closed containers and keep away from flames. It’s all about celluloid’s flammability.31
While researching this article I came across a few astonishing headlines and stories related to collars and exploding teeth, although not expressly mentioned as being made of celluloid. The imagery alone . . .
False Teeth Explode; Wreck Dental Office
Shenandoah Doctor’s Assistant Faints and Patient Nearly Swallows Rubber Sheet
A set of false teeth had “behaved in a very improper manner” in 1914 in a Shenandoah, Iowa dentist office. Upon placing the false teeth in a vulcanizer to be boiled, the jar exploded, blowing out two window lights into the street, narrowly missing pedestrians. The dental assistant fainted and the patient “nearly swallowed the rubber mouth protector.”32
SAVED BY HIS COLLAR
It’s hard to imagine this man’s life was spared by his collar after being run down by a locomotive. “He fell directly before the front wheels, but a projecting bolt caught his collar and held his head a few inches above the rail while the locomotive dragged him 300 feet. He was half choked and fainted when released by the train crew, but speedily recovered. Aside from a few bruises he is unhurt.”33
MAN BETWEEN 2 RATTLERS IS SAVED BY HIS COLLAR
William Shoupe didn’t normally wear a stiff collar while on the job as an oil field worker near Crystal Falls, Texas in October 1921. On his way to work his “flivver” broke down and he got and under the vehicle to fix the problem. Shoupe had been working away on his back for over thirty minutes when reaching for a pair of pliers he noticed a little peck on his neck. Must to his surprise he turned over and discovered a rattlesnake. He, of course, high-tailed it out from under the car. “An examination showed that the snake had been pinned down and had not been able to reach a vulnerable spot of Shoupe’s body. His venomous darts could not pierce the oil worker’s collar. The snake was killed and was found to have four rattles.”34
Oh the stories I find in newspaper archives! This article was extracted from the fifth issue of 2019 which focused on all things Victorian, a truly unique era.
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Footnotes:
Of Collar and Corset: Killed by His Collar
As noted in the last two articles, you can file this article under something I like to call “It Was a Victorian Thing”. “Saved by Her Corset” and “Killed by Her Corset” focused on deadly and life-saving female fashion. Now let’s take a look at the gents. Read any mid-to-late nineteenth century newspaper and you’re likely to find any number of ways people died, some rather gruesomely. Several years ago I started paying attention to some of them, although I don’t recall exactly how I came across these particular headlines in a number of newspapers across the United States.
According to the National Museum of American History, a male fashion accessory was introduced in the early 1800s, known as a separable collar. Men utilized the collar in order to look “dressed up”, its stiffness facilitated by pressing and heavy starching. Along with separable cuffs, it was a way for men of modest means to make themselves more presentable when the occasion called for it.
The early collars were generally made of linen and heavily starched to maintain stiffness. However, in the 1870s a new material was introduced, a plastic type of celluloid which had the appearance (and feel) of fine linen. In a way these were labor-saving devices, requiring no washing as this 1878 advertisement suggests.
After stumbling across the “killed by her corset” or “saved by her corset” headlines I began noticing similar headlines – “killed by his collar” or “saved by his collar”. Again, what was that all about? Much like corsets, the issue was related to the material used to manufacture fashionable men’s high collars.
Killed by His Celluloid Collar
William Wood, twenty-two years old, of Morristown, N.J., on Saturday night came to his death in a very singular manner. He was employed as a gardener. On Saturday night he was found stupidly drunk on a sidewalk by a policeman and was taken to the station house. Several of his friends secured his release by promising to take him home. Instead they left him in an outhouse. In the morning he was found dead. Examination showed that Wood lay in such a position that his stiff celluloid collar had pressed against his windpipe and strangled him.35
KILLED BY HIS COLLAR
Celluloid Neckband Brings a Carbuncle to a Jersey City Policeman
The almost obsolete celluloid collar question has been revived by the death of Policeman Enoch Perry, in Jersey City. Policeman Perry expired from the effects of a carbuncle on his neck, caused, his relatives say, by a celluloid collar, which he was compelled to wear by order of the police authorities. Sometime ago an order was issued from police headquarters in Jersey City requiring patrolmen to wear white gloves and collars. White cotton gloves were specified and a regulation collar made of celluloid was named as the decoration for the police neck.
There was much objection to the form of collar ordered. Patrolmen who had been comfortable all their lives with their necks encased in the upper works of a flannel shirt revived stories of the explosive qualities of celluloid and spread them. Within three days every policeman wearing a celluloid collar walked his beat in momentary fear that his head would be blown off.
Perry was the loudest objector on the force, but being a policeman of 25 years’ experience, he wore the collar. A few days ago a carbuncle developed on his neck and Perry told his fellow policemen that it had been caused by the irritation of the celluloid collar.36
Man Killed by His Collar
At the inquest into the death of Alexander Alcorn, who was found dead a few days ago sitting in a chair, the coroner’s physician who made the post-mortem examination testified that he had found a ring mark about Alcorn’s neck made by the collar and that the man had accidentally strangled himself to death while sitting asleep.
“The man was in a weak physical condition,” added the physician, “and the pressure of the tight collar on his neck was sufficient to produce strangulation.”37
ALMOST KILLED BY HIS COLLAR
Baseball Player Throws Back His Head and Cuts an Artery in the Neck
A stiff high collar nearly cost Edward Lateril his life yesterday while playing baseball. Running for a high fly, he threw back his head to look for the ball, and the sharp edge of the high collar severed an artery in the neck. He almost died from the loss of blood before he could be taken to the Emergency Hospital and the flow stopped.38
Killed by His Collar
High standing collars are now exclusively in vogue. The laws of health, however, require that the next should be left bare, or nearly so, and unrestrained in its movements. Hence, the collar should be loose and turn-down. More than one case has been recorded in which tight collars have almost caused suffocation, the victims being revived with difficulty. Some two years ago, on the arrival of the train from Nice at Paris, a rich American traveler was found dead in one of the compartments – strangled as the inquest disclosed, by his high collar, whose buttons had left its mark upon his skin. Nor is this at all an unlikely accident, since there is a point in the throat close to “Adam’s apple,” pressure upon which will stop respiration at once, and bring about asphyxia. Moreover, a collar which hardly feels uncomfortable while the wearer is standing may draw much tighter when he sits down, and should be fall asleep in it, may produce congestion, coma, and a fatal termination.39
As evidenced by these examples of “killed by his collar” articles, the dangers of either a tight collar or the sharp points of an overly stiff collar presented a potential and deadly hazard, most notably if one happened to fall asleep while wearing a celluloid collar. As with corsets which “killed”, these collars also “saved”, most notably from death by murder.
Next week, the extraordinary ways these same collars saved lives — plus a tie-in to “explosive teeth”. Stay tuned!
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Footnotes:
Of Collar and Corset: Killed by Her Corset
We can file this short series consisting of excerpts from a couple of articles published several years ago under something I like to call “It Was a Victorian Thing”. Last week the curious nineteenth century headline, “Saved by Her Corset” was analyzed. This week’s headline was seen in newspapers after corset makers switched from whalebone to steel to fashionably shape female Victorian waists.
Killed by Her Corset
While researching “Saved by Her Corset” headlines I began noticing “Killed by Corset” headlines as well, although these deaths weren’t caused by tight-lacing as doomful doctors had hypothesized for decades. Just as there was a reason for “Saved by Her Corset” headlines, there was a reason for “Killed by Corset” headlines.
Many of the “Killed” headlines occurred after corset designers began using steel stays. When the cost of whalebone increased dramatically in 1876, winter corsets would be fitted with steel stays that season, despite the dangers:
Owing to the disaster to the Arctic fleet, whalebone has gone up nearly 50 per cent in value, and only steel corsets will be worn this winter. Steel corsets are more objectionable than whalebone, on the ground of danger from lightning, but as there is a good deal more “give” to them, even when embraced by the left arm, we haven’t much of an opinion of a girl who won’t be willing to risk the lightning.22
Taking a fully steel-corseted stroll during a lightning storm was indeed a deadly hazard. This story was tragic in more ways than one:
On Allum Creek, in the county of Franklin, we are informed that a young lady was struck by lightning, and expired immediately. She had on a steel corset board, which it is supposed drawed [sic] the lightning. Young ladies should be cautious how they make use of steel. She was to have been married in a few weeks. This is an evidence that “in the midst of life we are in death.”23
Steel Corsets
Three young ladies were killed by lightning at Jacobsboro, Ohio, Sunday, while returning home from church. It is thought that their steel corsets was [sic] the cause of their death, as a young lady who was without a steel corset was only stunned. Now what young lady will discard steel corsets on this warning?24
Killed by Her Corset Stays
Mrs. George Lewis and Mrs. Frank Sheets were driving today when their horse ran away. Mrs. Lewis jumped and broker her arm. Mrs. Sheets was thrown from the buggy, her corset broke and the stays were driven into her stomach, killing her.25
Killed by a Corset
A lady bicyclist was killed in Massachusetts yesterday by having a corset steel run into her heart. This all goes to show the folly of trying to be a new woman and at the same time sticking to the foibles and superstitions of the old woman. Cycling is certainly the avocation of the new woman – and, in fact, sometimes seems to be the vocation; while the corset belongs without a doubt to the ante-bloomer woman. An attempt to reconcile these two extremes is bound to prove futile.26
Miss Friend’s Tight Stays Displaced Her Heart and Ended Life
Miss Frankie Friend, aged 27, of Norwalk, died here last night under peculiar circumstances. She got off a car from Cleveland and became faint and weak. She was assisted to the waiting room by two women and later set to a physician’s office. She was dead when placed on a couch.
A post-mortem examination today showed her heart to be entirely out of place on account of her corset, which was ten sizes too small. Tight lacing killed her.27
The corset wasn’t merely an undergarment – it reflected societal and cultural norms and more than a few controversies of the Victorian era. Yet, the ladies still argued mightily for its virtues.
There is no doubt that Fashion makes the world more brilliant – a better place to live in.28
Some argued just as vociferously against corsets, forming “anti-lacing” societies. I’m always amazed at what Victorians, in particular, found to fret, fume, feud and fight over. Someday I’ll have to write about the “butter battle” – oh, what a feud that was!
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Footnotes:
Of Collar and Corset: Saved by Her Corset
Saved by Her Corset
We can file this short series consisting of excerpts from a couple of articles published several years ago under something I like to call “It Was a Victorian Thing”.
Read any mid-to-late nineteenth century newspaper and you’re likely to find any number of ways people died. Several years ago I started paying attention to some of them, although I don’t recall exactly how I came across these particular headlines in a number of newspapers across the United States. The first headlines and stories I noticed weren’t about someone dying in an unusual way, but rather saved from dying. Those headlines would typically read something like “Saved by Her Corset”:
SAVED BY HER CORSET STEEL
The life of Annie Blondi, seventeen years old, of Liberty avenue and Linwood street, Brooklyn, was saved yesterday morning by her corset. Michael Bianco, an Italian forty-four years old, who lives in the same house, fired a pistol shot at the girl and the bullet struck her corset steel and glanced off.40
SAVED BY HER CORSET
A Young Trojan’s Attempt to Kill the Girl He Says He Married
Troy, Nov. 15 – Edward Daly, son of James Daly, of this city, made a desperate attempt to kill Mollie Nealon last night by shooting her. Daly says he married the girl some time ago, but she will not admit it. . . Yesterday he purchased a revolver and went into a saloon, and said he was going to shoot himself. The pistol was taken away form him. This afternoon Daly bought another revolver and last night he met the Nealon girl uptown and started with her for her home. He told he was going to shoot himself, but he wanted to kill her first. He pointed the pistol at her several times, but she said he was “only fooling.” When within a block of Miss Nealon’s home Daly shot at her, and the bullet struck her over the left breast. She ran into the house and fell in a faint. The bullet was found imbedded in Miss Nealon’s corset, and it is believed the corset saved his [sic] life. Daly declares he will kill her and himself.41
Saved by Her Corset
Herman Witke made a desperate attempt to kill Maggie Christman, 18 years of age, at Racine, Wis., The other morning, and a corset was all that saved the girl’s life. . . Witke had been paying her attention and they were engaged to be married. They had a quarrel. . . He caught hold of her and threw her to the ground in the back yard, pulled a revolver and pressed it to her breast and fired three shots, the girl fighting desperately for her life. The explosion of the revolver set her clothing on fire, but she broke away and ran to Main street. It was found that one of the bullets struck a steel of her corset, broke it and cut her flesh at the pit of the stomach, which was the only wound she sustained, and the corset saved her life.42
SAVED BY HER CORSET
Mrs. Stokes Fires Two Shots at Herself, but is too Well Armored
In 1888 a Chicago woman attempted suicide “because she could obtain no relief for her sore eyes.” Her eyes had been troubling for some time, keeping her awake at nights. One morning she was so despondent that she decided to end it all. She loaded a revolver, went to her bedroom and fired a shot at her breast. “The bullet was deflected by one of the steel ribs in her corset. She fired a second shot. The bullet glanced from another corset rib, and inflicted a slight flesh wound in her left breast.”43 Darned corset – oh my sore eyes!
This one was definitely “over-dramatic”:
SHE WAS SAVED BY HER CORSET
Margaret Mather Uses a Real Dagger and Stabs Herself in the Breast
Peterboro, Ontario, Sept. 30. – The presentation of “Romeo and Juliet” in Bradburn’s opera house Saturday night by Miss Margaret Mather and her company very nearly resulted in real tragedy. The dagger which Miss Mather used in the last scene had been stolen at Kingston and she used a sharp dagger belonging to one of the company. In the intensity of her zeal in acting she forgot about the change in the weapons and when she rose in anguish form the prostrate form of the poisoned Romen she plunged the dagger into her breast. The sharp point of the weapon wen through her corset and pierced the flesh a little below the heart. Despite the pain and bleeding she finished the scene amid the plaudits of the audience, who were unaware that any real pain was suffered. She was carried half fainting to the dressing room. Fortunately, the wound, although painful, was not serious, the corset having arrested the force of the blow.44
These are but a few of the “Saved by Her Corset” headlines I collected and wrote about.
Up until the late 1870s, corsets utilized whalebone (most of the stories noted above appear to have occurred while the woman was wearing a steel corset). Whalebone was not bone at all, but “an elastic, horny substance growing in place of teeth in the upper jaw of certain whales.”45 It was cartilage-like, strong yet flexible. Perfect for shaping the waist, “in spite of all the fat that nature can lay on.” When the cost of whalebone increased dramatically in 1876, winter corsets would be fitted with steel stays that season.
That’s around the time when “corset” headlines, unfortunately, shifted to also include “Killed by Her Corset”. Stay tuned next week for Part 2. The full article was published in the May-June 2019 issue of Digging History Magazine.
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Footnotes:
Eleven Days of Hellish Heat
I know, I know …. it’s summer. It’s supposed to be hot, but I’m ready for a break in this heat. This article was originally published in the August 2018 issue of Digging History Magazine (on sale at a reduced price). It was a contrast to several articles also included in this issue related to the 1898 Alaskan Gold Rush.
Today, with widespread availability of air conditioning this weather nightmare which occurred 107 (now 115) years ago might seem a bit far-fetched as everything east of the Rocky Mountains, including areas of Canada, was baking under intense heat in July 1911. In Iowa and Nebraska the oat and corn crops were burning up, with temperatures between 102 and 108.
On the East Coast, as residents prepared to head to the beaches for an extended Fourth of July holiday, things were heating up as well. New York City recorded temperatures between 94 and 100 degrees on July 2. As of early morning July 3 at least ten victims were thought to have died as a direct or indirect result of the heat (9 had drowned) with numbers expected to climb.
The Midwest continued to bake and one location in Ontario, Canada had hit a record 108 degrees. Four hundred thousand had descended on Coney Island the day before, seeking relief from the heat. There was no wind to speak of and the overcrowding probably made it even hotter. Animals suffered as well as policemen were forced to shoot dozens of horses.
The New York Tribune observed how civility abounded despite the searing heat. That was about to change as the heat spell dragged on for several days. Hartford, Connecticut hit an all-time high of 100 degrees on July 3; Beverly, Massachusetts recorded a temperature of 108. Other cities around the country hit the century mark as well. Generally speaking, it was hot from coast to coast, yet the East Coast seemed to suffer the most. The heat reminded one of the fire and brimstone of early Methodism, the Tribune opined.46
Dying from excessive heat and the inability of one’s body to maintain normal fluid levels and such or drowning while out for a swim to cool off were tragic ways to die, but some people literally went insane and committed irrational acts, including suicide, in response to soaring and unrelenting temperatures. One of the ways those supposedly overcome with excessive heat decided to end it was by swallowing carbolic acid.
At the time it appears ingestion of carbolic acid was one of the preferred methods for offing oneself. A search at Newspapers.com for “carbolic acid” during the month of July 1911 will yield well over 1,500 results. Since the turn of the twentieth century it was one of the most commonly used poisons in suicide cases (a similar search for the phrase, plus the word “suicide” in the time period 1900-1920 will yield over 109,000 results).
Carbolic acid, a common household disinfectant at the time, was also being touted as a means to rid one’s home of the pesky housefly – “twenty drops of carbolic acid on a hot shovel. The vapor is deadly to the pest.”47 Here are just a few examples of heat-crazed acts of suicide by carbolic acid (or so it was said):
- In Baltimore, where temperatures hovered near 100 degrees, a heat-crazed man swallowed carbolic acid.48
- Mrs. August Kiehl of Oshkosh, Wisconsin was preparing breakfast and at 5:15 a.m. Committed suicide by drinking carbolic acid in the basement of her home. “No particular reason can be assigned for the act, except that the excessive heat unbalanced her mind, the temperature going considerably above 100 degrees.”49
- “William A. Rausch [of Chicago], told his wife he could not endure the heat; went into basement and swallowed carbolic acid.”50
Swallowing poison was by no means the only insanity-driven method used to escape heat prostration. And, to be fair, not all of the suicides during the time period in question may have actually been heat-driven. However, when normal, well-adjusted people suddenly decided to end it all, soaring and sustained heat was blamed.
Across the country record temperatures were being recorded, but the eastern seaboard seems to have suffered the most and, in particular, Hartford, Connecticut.
Hartford, Connecticut
The alarming heat, and the public’s response, moved officials in Hartford to open fire hydrants and allow residents to ride ferries and trolleys for free – anything to generate a personal breeze or some means to find relief. Some would ride the merry-go-round for the same reason.
Parks were filled with people seeking heat relief, even choosing to sleep (what little sleep could be had) there at night. Mothers walked the streets at night trying to comfort their crying babies, all the while afraid to lay them down for fear they wouldn’t wake up.
Desperate to get above the heat, some would climb up fire escapes, head to the hills or ascend to the rooftops in hopes of finding relief. In Hartford, John Merlo, an Italian railroad worker, climbed to the roof of his tenement building to sleep. Amazingly, one newspaper account noted the building had a tin roof (which hardly seems to be a good idea in a heat wave!) and Merlo had taken nightly refuge there since the heat wave began. That alone seems a bit “insane”!
Around midnight one night he was sleeping and apparently rolled over the shallow gutter and fell to his death. Merlo fell four stories, striking his head directly on the concrete below and was instantly killed, apparently unaware of falling.
One of the most shocking incidents of death by insanity occurred near the end of the heat wave. Thousands had been adversely affected and more than a few said to have been driven mad. However, when Hartford resident Lyman Dudley Smith suddenly snapped on the morning of July 10 it caused quite a stir.
Smith, a highly respected school teacher and author of the Smith System of Penmanship, was vacationing at his brother’s summer cottage in Maine, no doubt trying to escape the heat – to no avail. Maine, as well as parts of Canada, were breaking heat records as well. Although he had been suffering from an attack of grippe, his actions were attributed to the heat. Smith committed suicide by slitting his own throat with a penknife.
The heat took a toll on infrastructure as well. Asphalt streets oozed and “pitched boiled out of wood block pavements.”51 The heat was also literally bending railroad and trolley tracks, causing derailments. On the other side of the country, a deadly incident was reported in Oregon when a “sun kink” caused rails to spread under the hot sun.52 “Spreading rails” caused an accident in St. Louis.53
As one might imagine, ice was in great demand and headlines announcing “ice famines” were common during that 11-day stretch, especially in Indiana. The ice shortage was compounded in New Castle, Indiana by a number of typhoid fever cases. In Muncie, Indiana ice was sold only in 5-cent quantities and soda shops were closed. Only those homes with children could expect to purchase up to 25-pound quantities.
Demand for ice attributed to a horrific accident in Boston when two children were attempting to get some ice chips off an ice cart. A four-year-old boy was standing on the wheel when the horses started. He was “ground to death” under the wheel while a five-year old girl was crushed by a falling block of ice.54 Ice plants were running at full capacity in Kansas City, yet an ice shortage still loomed.
The Fourth of July held promise of even more heat and the annual celebration’s own brand of insanity. Still, one newspaper reported on July 5 that the Fourth had actually been “sane” in comparison to previous record-setting years. President Taft had admonished citizens to “refrain from dangerous celebration” and apparently it had an effect. In 1910 131 deaths had occurred around the country as the result of “over-celebrating” with fireworks, canons and other explosive devices. In 1911 only 24 deaths had been reported – 12 by fireworks; 7 by firearms; 2 by gunpowder and 3 by toy pistol.55
One incident of attempted murder was blamed on heat craziness when bookbinder George Besal attacked his mother with shears and threatened his cousin. It took four men to get him loaded into an ambulance, and while en route to the hospital he managed to break out of the straitjacket he’d been fitted with. Although Besal had attacked his mother the month before, this attack was blamed on the heat.
The heat disrupted everyday life during the heat wave as services such as coal and mail delivery were suspended. Early 1900s fashion still meant men wore suit jackets (shed those) and women long skirts and corsets. Some women switched to a decidedly breezy undergarment called a summer undermuslin instead.
On the evening of July 6 a violent, but heat-relieving, storm pounded parts of Connecticut. One tenement house in Litchfield County was struck, severely injuring two women hit by a bolt of lightning. While the storm brought rain and a measure of relief and an all-too-brief respite, two days later heat was again the topic of conversation.
Unique, even strange, headlines continued to appear in newspapers around the country, but especially in New England. On the morning of July 10, the Norwich Bulletin reported:
FIFTY MADE INSANE BY HOT WAVE
A retired drug merchant was one of the victims and physicians claimed the cause was “paralysis of the brain, caused by heat”56 Reports of heat-crazed suicide were still being reported, BUT one column over was a hopeful bit of news:
COOLER WEATHER IS DUE THIS WEEK
Kansas and Oklahoma had just received much-needed rain and it was heading east. Indeed, rain and cooler weather did eventually come.
Boston too had been overwhelmed with the heat wave. Boston Commons was dubbed the largest boarding house in New England – as many as five thousand men, women and children slept there nightly.
By July 11, Boston was looking forward to the promise of rain and cooler temperatures. In fact, it was the only answer to a situation which had become a crisis. The state’s bathhouses had been overwhelmed with thousands of bathers and thousands more were still waiting in line.
Demand far exceeded the number of available bathhouses and citizens were up-in-arms. On the evening of July 12 Hartford residents heard distant thunder, although nothing happened. Some time later, however, lightning began to flash and rain poured for over an hour.
Then, something happened that hadn’t occurred in several days – a refreshing breeze followed the storm. The New England heat wave was over!
What a relief, but what had caused the aberrant weather patterns? It wasn’t that New England didn’t experience hot weather in the summer, but normally cool ocean breezes made it tolerable. According to the New England Historical Society, “hot, dry air from the southern plains flowed into Canada and then swept south and toward the [east] coast.”57
While newspapers made much of the 1911 heat wave (as well they should have), in terms of deaths from the heat it was reminiscent of another New England heat wave which had occurred fifteen years earlier in 1896. That stretch of heat (with up to 90 percent humidity) lasted almost two weeks. More than 1,500 people died from heat-related illnesses – and suicide. Headlines like this one appeared:
Scores of Persons Stricken Down by the Heat
Insanity Drives to Suicide and Murder
In St. Louis one man who was said to have become demented from the heat jumped off a roof. A domestic servant ran screaming down a levee, jumped in the river and drowned, obviously demented from the heat it was reported. In Baltimore Richard Lyons, a car builder, “driven insane by the heat . . . beat out with a hammer the brains of Jennie Shipley.”58
Much like the 1911 event, the morning of August 13 brought a little breeze and by the following morning rain had fallen in some places, the heat wave ended. As many as 1500 had died in New York City alone. In a strange twist of fate – weather and politics – police commissioner Theodore Roosevelt made a name for himself by passing out free ice to the city’s poor, no doubt ingratiating himself to the New York’s teeming masses.
The 1911 heat wave wasn’t the first, nor would it be the last to make headlines. The introduction of air conditioning would, or course, eventually make “heat-crazed insanity” characteristic of the 1896 and 1911 heat waves less common, but can you imagine what it would be like today if we, like our ancestors, had to live under those conditions. Would we go crazy too?
Thanks for stopping by! Please consider subscribing to Digging History Magazine. The current series features the history of individual states and how to find the best historical and genealogical records. Purchasing a subscription entitles you to subscriber benefits (20% off all services, including custom-designed family history charts) AND a chance to win your very own custom-designed family history chart! Details here (or click the ad below).
Footnotes:
Documenting Family History: July Was a Busy Month
July was a busy month. After wrapping up the latest issue of Digging History Magazine, featuring the Prairie State of Illinois, I tackled a number of client projects — genealogical research, writing family stories and designing family history charts. Here are some examples.
Family Stories: The Fine Print
I’ve recently developed a new service to accompany the custom-designed family history charts. I call it “The Fine Print” which tells the stories represented on these custom-designed charts (no two are alike!). A name, date or newspaper clipping only tells part of the story. This project is still ongoing, but here are a few page samples:
Custom-Designed Family History Charts
The latest custom-designed family history charts were part of a unique project, one which included documentation of birth parents as well as adoptive parents. It was truly an honor to help document this family’s amazing history — from missionaries to numerous American patriots (including close relatives of the father of our country, George Washington) to a Salem witch. By the way, these charts were designed for subscribers to Digging History Magazine making them eligible for a significant discount (20% off all services, including charts).
For more information about my services, including custom-designed family history charts (and the stories behind them): https://digging-history.com/services/
Thanks for stopping by! Please consider subscribing to Digging History Magazine. The current series features the history of individual states and how to find the best historical and genealogical records. Purchasing a subscription entitles you to subscriber benefits (20% off all services, including custom-designed family history charts) AND a chance to win your very own custom-designed family history chart! Details here (or click the ad below).
Believe it or not . . . . stranger things have happened: Ocular Explosions
In June of 1932 a column appeared in newspapers across the country, entitled “Questions and Answers from Washington”. Apparently it was a chance for everyday citizens to ask a burning question which was answered by someone in Washington, D.C. The questions ranged from “How is Italian salami made?” To “Can fleas be trained?” – and everything in between.
One question posed was “Can a glass eye explode?”. The answer: “A glass or porcelain eye might explode due to some chemical change in the material used, but the recorded occurrences are extremely rare.”59 Hmm . . . tell that to Frank R. Minner, an Allentown, Pennsylvania building inspector whose glass eye exploded, “with a report like a pistol shot.”60
Very few who knew Minner were aware he even had a glass eye after losing his left eye in a building accident twenty years before the freakish accident in 1911. The man who was receiving a building permit was shocked to observe Minner remove his hand from the eye and see him bleeding profusely. Minner was in shock and fainted.
Dr. Eugene M. Kistler had no idea what caused the glass eye to explode, nor could the original optician. Minner remained in shock but was expected to recover unless tiny splinters of glass had been blown back into his brain. Allentown doctors and scientists were truly baffled as to what caused the exploding glass eye.
This wasn’t the first time, nor the last, an exploding glass eye made headlines. According to a column61 by Dr. Van Dellen, glass eyes were first produced in the sixteenth century, although some believe the practice dates back to the fifth century B.C. when Egyptians crafted ocular prostheses called Ectblepharons.62 These were made from painted clay or enameled metal, attached to a piece of cloth and worn outside the socket. Ambroise Parê, a French surgeon, is most often credited as the father of artificial eye design in the sixteenth century. The first ones weren’t particularly comfortable to wear, however, causing the eyelid to protrude.
The term “glass eye” was mentioned in a 1743 British weekly newspaper, advertising the services of surgeon Joseph Baker who claimed adeptness at his profession: “He likewise infallibly cures deafness, takes out teeth with a touch, and puts in ivory teeth, also artificial glass eyes, so as not to be discernable.”63 In the mid-1800s German glass artisans developed a technique for making the artificial prostheses and German immigrant ocularists are credited with bringing them to America. American ocularists continued to make their own, but the material (kryolite) was imported from Germany.64
One story surfaced during the Civil War of a soldier with a glass eye who had enlisted and was discharged twelve different times. He was referred to as a “bounty jumper” because he would repeatedly enlist, pass the physical, get his bounty and then convince the camp doctor he should be discharged due to defective vision. This occurred repeatedly, but when Everett Babett attempted it a thirteenth time that proved to be the unlucky one apparently. Denied a discharge, he deserted, was captured and sentenced to be shot, although one source reported his sentence was commuted and he would be banished to the Dry Tortugas (Florida) for three years.65
In 1869 glass eyes were made of enamel, a type of glass, designed to last, at the most, only a year.66 In late 1869 it was reported that six hundred men were employed in the manufacture of glass eyes in America, not surprising since many soldiers lost eyes during the Civil War.67
I love browsing through nineteenth century newspaper archives. You never know what stories and headlines will pop up. Much like, “Saved by Her Corset” or “Killed by Her Corset” and “Saved by His Collar” or “Killed by His Collar” (look for those stories in future articles), stories about glass eyes began to appear in the 1870s:
- A gentleman from the East experienced something unusual in November of 1872 while visiting Wichita, Kansas. A gust of wind blew his glass eye right out of his head! “He wants to know if we have a blind asylum in Kansas, and if that zephyr was unusually heavy for this latitude.”68
- “A singular story of coincidences”: In 1873 Boston police were searching for a man by the name of W.H. Johnson who reportedly had a glass eye. They found a W.H. Johnson in Bangor, Maine with a glass eye, but he was the wrong man. Another man, totally innocent, with the same name and a glass eye was located in Salem, Massachusetts. A telegram reported that a W.H. Johnson with a glass eye was arrested in Newburyport, Massachusetts, and “he likewise proved to be the wrong customer.” Authorities were baffled, knowing that somewhere out there was a fourth W.H. Johnson with a glass eye, “that is, unless he happens to be the wrong W.H. Johnson with a glass eye.”69
Of course, men weren’t the only ones to utilize glass eyes, but one man in Rochester, New York was unnerved to the point of seeking a divorce over his wife’s glass eye which was inflicting “unendurable torments upon him.” His specific complaint was the fact his wife slept with her glass eye wide open at night. The New York Times sympathized, albeit tongue-in-cheek, with him:
At first sight this may seem a trivial matter, but a little reflection will lead us to deeply sympathize with the aggrieved husband. It is not unpleasant for a man to return home from a political meeting at 2 o’clock in the morning, knowing that however softly he may remove his innumerable boots, or however skillfully he may avoid tumbling over the chairs on which he had deposited his hats, the sleepless glass eye of his wife will gleam in the light of the two bedroom candles, and follow his wandering movements with a pitiless glare. The most sober of men cannot awake in the stillness of the night and feel quite at ease when he finds a glass eye watching him as sternly as though its owner knew all about his rash bet on the election of Mr. Tilden, and was waiting to explain how a man who had refused to buy a new parlor carpet could justifiably throw away his money in gambling.70
The man had tried everything he could think of to keep his wife’s eye closed, but to no avail. While expressing a sort of mocking sympathy, the Times hoped that he would lose his suit since it would cause the courts to be overwhelmed with others seeking divorces for similar reasons. They surmised that a court could grant a separation for a wife who found out her husband wore false teeth or a divorce over a wooden leg.
Clearly, the Times had a little fun with that story.
Women may have been a bit self-conscious, however, about wearing a glass eye. A “street-car mystery” was reported by the Detroit Free Press in 1877. Four women and a man were riding together when one of the women sneezed. The man discovered a glass eye under a parcel and asked “who sneezed her glass eye out?” The women turned either red or pale and cast sly glances. One by one each of the women denied having sneezed out her glass eye and exited the trolley, leaving the man to wonder why the woman hadn’t claimed it.71
Several hundred glass eyes were reported to have been sold annually, and eventually animals would be fitted with the artificial prostheses, the demand for them “much larger than most people would imagine.” While dogs and horses were most frequently fitted with glass eyes, the result of accident or disease, cats might also be candidates.72
Glass Eyes. Their Manufacture, Sale and Ruse
By the 1880s the operation for replacing a natural eye with a glass one enabled skilled surgeons to fit the glass eye on a stump following amputation of parts of the eye, allowing the glass eye to move naturally, and presumably appear less “creepy.” Clearly, some people were self-conscious, disguising the fact they were wearing one by utilizing a glass eye for daylight hours with a small pupil and one for night with a larger pupil “to offset the dilation”.73
Suffice it to say that glass eyes were becoming more common as articles mentioning them abounded in newspapers across the country. A story might mention someone’s glass eye shattering as the result of it falling out or being knocked out, but never until the early twentieth century did the headline “Glass Eye Explodes” begin to appear. It did seem rather curious and comical in some instances.
One of the first articles appeared in 1910 when, coincidentally, a man was walking up stairs for an appointment to visit his eye specialist. It just suddenly burst with a “loud report” with, quite fortunately, no injuries reported.74 For a period of several years, these types of headlines would appear with all-too-similar stories:
HIS GLASS EYE EXPLODES.
A man in Austin, Texas experienced the “most peculiar accident on record” when Arthur Nichols’ left glass eye exploded while he was sitting at the supper table in early 1914. Slivers of glass were embedded in his face and an oculist removed them. As it turned out, Nichols had not one glass eye but two for he was totally blind.75
GLASS EYE EXPLODES WHILE FARMER READS.
M.C. Canterberry, a Huntingon, West Virginia farmer, escaped without a scratch when his glass eye exploded while reading the morning newspaper. With his good eye he had espied an article of interest, and leaning forward to get a better look, the artificial eye exploded and fell onto the paper. He described it as similar in nature to an electric light bulb bursting, albeit on a smaller scale. One doctor believed it may have been caused by a muscular contraction. Canterberry had heard of hogs blowing up after eating dynamite or men injured by exploding golf balls and doubted the veracity of those stories – now he said he would believe anything!76
GLASS EYE EXPLODES AFTER YEARS WEAR.
In Boulder, Colorado a man was reclining on the courthouse square when his glass eye suddenly exploded. Fortunately, the glass eye exploded outward and he only suffered minor cuts. An eye specialist believed a small amount of celluloid in the glass eye and the heat from his body caused it to explode.77
HIS GLASS EYE EXPLODES.
While the nation was on pins and needles awaiting news of whether Woodrow Wilson had been re-elected, a New Jersey man was watching an automobile go by when his glass eye suddenly exploded. An elaborate theory held that “a sunray from the automobile wind shield, or perhaps the headlight reflection, created a penetrating flash which generated enough heat to cause the explosion.”78
HIS GLASS EYE EXPLODES WHEN HE LOOKS AT A PIE
Farmer is Made Unconscious by Miniature Blast as He Eats in Restaurant.
An Indiana farmer had days earlier received a glass eye after losing his natural one as a result of a dynamite explosion. “Just as he was gazing with interest yesterday at a piece of pie, F.K. Cosgrove’s glass eye exploded and he fell from his chair to the floor in a restaurant. He was soon revived.”79
GLASS EYE “EXPLODES” WHEN HE GETS BAD NEWS.
Tony Sara of Freeport, Long Island had previously injured his eye with a screwdriver and had a glass eye inserted. In September of 1921 he received news that his brother had been struck while riding a bicycle and injured. Upon hearing the news, Tony’s glass eye exploded, apparently from internal stresses in the glass (or perhaps his own “internal stress”?).80
GLASS EYE EXPLODES
Indianan, Awakened By Report, Thought He Had Been Shot).
Cleve Willis was awakened one night by a sharp report and feeling blood stream down his cheek thought he’d been shot. His glass eye had shattered while he slept.81
GLASS EYE EXPLODES INJURING GOOD ONE
A Novel Accident Charged Against the Cold.
A Ranger, Texas man had stepped outside of a warm house during near freezing weather when his glass eye apparently exploded due to the sudden temperature change.82
It seemed more often than not the cause of exploding glass eyes was blamed on sudden temperature changes, although in 1931 a North Carolina man blamed his doctor and sued for $15,000 in damages and lost wages.83 The “glass eye explodes” stories began to taper off, however, in the 1940s.
World War II brought about difficulties in importing kryolite glass from Germany, and necessity being the mother of invention, scientists began developing other materials. The Department of the Navy began developing medical grade acrylic plastic for use in making artificial eyes. Technology gradually improved until today most ocular prostheses are made of acrylic.
Still, it’s curious that after years of widespread usage, those “Glass Eye Explodes” headlines started popping up around 1910. Things that make you go “hmm”.
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Oh, The Stories I Find: In a Dead Woman’s Eye
As a genealogist and writer, I absolutely LOVE researching newspaper archives. I’m finding new resources for historic newspaper archives all the time, but my favorite sites include Newspapers.com, GenealogyBank and Newspaper Archive. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve come across some of the most unusual headlines. Sometimes, I’m inspired to do a little extra digging and write an article. This is one of those articles. Read on.
This intriguing headline appeared in The Sun (New York) on December 27, 1894, followed by an even more intriguing subtitle:
THE SUPPOSED IMAGE OF HER MURDERER SEEN IN THE RETINA 84
First of all, was this even possible? In the late nineteenth century the idea wasn’t as far-fetched as one might think. The possibilities had intrigued scientists for some time, especially since photography was invented in the 1840s, although amazingly the idea had been around since the 17th century when a Jesuit priest, Christoph Scheiner (also a physicist and astronomer), claimed to have noted an image on the retina of a frog he was dissecting. Was the faint image he observed perhaps the last thing the frog saw upon death? Nevertheless, the idea had been introduced and would eventually play a role in the evolution of photography.
It wasn’t much of a leap to realize the concepts of photography and the inner workings of the human eye were related. In May 1863 Mr. Warner, a London photographer, wrote a letter to the Photographic News (later reprinted in other newspapers) after reading an account of a young woman’s murder. He had immediately written a letter to the detective in charge of investigating the crime, informing him “that if the eye of a murdered person be photographed within a certain time after death, upon the retina will be found depicted the last thing that appeared before them, and that in the present case the features of the murderer would most probably be found thereon.”85
Warner was sure it was possible, since four years earlier (for reasons unclear) he had taken a photograph of the eye of a calf not long after its death. Upon placing the negative under a microscope he found what he believed to be an image, imprinted on the animal’s retina, of pavement lines on the slaughterhouse floor, which he assumed must have been the last scene
viewed by the animal prior to death. Unfortunately, the negative had since been broken and the pieces lost. With the permission of detective James F. Thompson he proceeded to share his photographic discovery with colleagues.
Warner considered “the subject is of too great importance and interest to be passed heedlessly by, because if the fact were known through the length and breadth of the land, it would, in my estimation, tend materially to decrease that most horrible of all crimes – murder.” Thompson agreed the possibilities were of the “greatest importance”. However, in the case of Emma Jackson’s murder it was “unavailing in this instance” since he had first seen her body forty hours after the crime and her eyes had already been closed. A post mortem examination had been made and she had already been buried earlier that week.
Thompson had been informed by an “eminent oculist some four years ago” that a decedent’s eyes must be photographed within twenty-four hours of death. Otherwise, whatever object might have been imprinted would have vanished “in the same manner as an undeveloped negative photograph exposed to light.”86 French journalists picked up the story which eventually made its way to the United States, at the time embroiled in the Civil War.
In September stories began appearing in United States newspapers about a reported attempt to solve a horrific crime near Evansville, Indiana by examining the retinas of a murdered German family.
Horrible Homicide! A Father and Three Children Murdered! 87
On August 29 a German man named Henry Herke and some of his children were brutally murdered. Herke’s wife, Louise, was away at the time, having gone to market earlier in the day. When she returned home around 11:00 a.m. a horrific, bloody scene awaited.
All victims had been brutally murdered – first reports indicating they had been struck by an axe, their heads nearly severed from their shoulders. Neither the cause nor the identity of the perpetrator(s) was known to authorities, although neighbors had observed two men exiting the home earlier that morning around daylight, headed toward a nearby swamp. The house had been ransacked.
The sheriff and several deputies, plus a group of citizens who formed a posse comitatus, were soon scouring the area in search of the murderers. The following day two soldiers were arrested at a nearby hospital, one named Crow and the other H.C. Roberts.
Justice was, of course, swifter in those days. A preliminary trial commenced on the morning of September 2. Louise Herke was the prosecution’s first witness. She had gone to market that day with her oldest son and left five children with Henry, one of them her niece. When she arrived home she found the gate open, although the house door was closed.
Upon entering the house her two youngest daughters ran to her and told Louise how two men had cut them with an axe.
I then discovered the oldest girl, daughter of my sister, lying on the floor in a pool of blood. I picked up the girl, who died in my arms; the boy lived till evening, but neither of them spoke. My little girl told me that two men, one big one and one little one, had come to the house; the little one stayed outside, and the big one went into the house and turned everything over. They then went out around the corner and returned. The big one staid [sic] outside, and the little one picked up the axe and “chopped them down.” I saw the axe on the porch. It was bloody and had hair on it. My little boy showed me the axe as the one he was killed with [apparently before he died]. . . My neighbor, Carl Hines, came by the fence, and discovered my husband’s body. I went and saw him, all bloody, and the axe by him on the fence.88
The newspaper account of the first day’s proceedings made special note of the defendants’ heights – Crow being about 5 feet, 4 inches tall and Roberts about 5 feet, 8 inches tall with a mustache. In addition, other details following their arrest certainly seemed to incriminate the two soldiers.
Tracks leading away from the house had been discovered and upon arresting the two the sheriff had taken them to the tracks and “found that the shoes fitted exactly in the prints; they were army shoes.”89 Additional tracks suggested the perpetrators had been running away, and in one track they found the imprint of three nails which corresponded with the nails in their shoes.
The following day a photographer named Joseph Adams testified that a photograph of Henry Herke had been taken by his father [unclear if Adams’ or Herke’s father] from which Adams produced a magnified picture. Adams claimed (and presented it as evidence) that it showed “the figure of a man in the eye of the victim. He testified:
The outlines are dim; moustache blacker and heavier from effects of chemicals used in magnifying; looks to me as much like one man as another; you can observe high cheek bones, a moustache; think the chin had no beard on; looks to me like a crazy, wild or drunken man; seems to me no sane man in a state of excitement could look that way; in my mind, picture should not convict any man, it is too indistinct; bears no resemblance to prisoner, Roberts, except the ears and high cheek bones.90
Despite Adams’ admission that the supposed image was too indistinct to serve as proof, and the favorable testimony of several witnesses for the defense, Crow and Roberts were bound over for trial. However, in late October the two were released, “the Grand Jury having failed to find bills against them.”91
Nevertheless, Joseph Adams had caused quite a stir and continued to investigate and experiment, although some thought his claims quite incredulous. Still, one noted member of the medical profession, Dr. J.P. DeBrueler, who was also a member of the medical faculty at the Medical College of Evansville, took a painstakingly close look for himself and saw a human face.
Subsequent newspaper accounts provided additional details of Adams’ experiment:
He had taken an ambrotype picture of the eye of the deceased, and then rubbing out everything but a single object apparently in the centre of the eye, this was placed under an ordinary magnifying glass. At the first glance the object appeared blurred and indistinct, but, getting the proper focus, the outlines of a human face were at once distinguishable. The image was apparently the face of a man with unusually prominent cheek bones, long nose, and rather broad forehead. A black moustache was plainly seen, and also the direction of the eyes, which seemed to be looking at some object sidewise. One of the eyes was as clearly seen as the eyes in a common ambrotype or fenotype.92
Perhaps dead men did tell tales. Still, it wasn’t C.S.I., Victorian-style. In the 1870s the idea was pursued once again by two German physiologists, Franz Christian Boll and Wilhelm Kühne. Boll discovered rhodopsin, a light-sensitive protein retinal receptor which facilitates absorption of green-blue light. He found the pigment in the rods of the retina and when exposed to light would “bleach”, yet could be restored in the dark even following death.
Kühne saw potential in Boll’s research and believed it “could be used to preserve images in the eye from the moment of death, as the images would remain etched into the pigment unless exposed to light.” If a process could be developed whereby the last retinal image could be preserved, then much like the image projected on a photographic plate, it could be analyzed.
The process was called optography and Kühne continued to pursue the possibilities of advancing forensic science by finding a way “to pry these last images from the eyes of the dead and develop them, just like a photograph.”93 He truly believed it possible to develop a method whereby heinous crimes could be solved using his research.
His first experiments were with animals – and, of course, the animal had to be killed, decapitated and its eyes removed, the quicker the better. His most promising result occurred in 1878 when the removal and dissection of a rabbit’s retina yielded an image of a barred window. Kühne had purposely turned the rabbit so it would be staring at the window. Further experimentation proved inconclusive and images were often indistinct and blurry. The goal, of course, was to produce an image from a human retina and Kühne got his chance when a man was executed by guillotine on November 16, 1880 for drowning his young children.
Following the decapitation Kühne was allowed to immediately retrieve the man’s left eye to begin dissection of the retina. While he observed what he thought to be the blade, his findings were later disputed – the man had been blindfolded at the time, so perhaps the last image was the steps leading to the executioner’s blade. Inconclusive results did not deter Kühne, nor other researchers.
Families and some members of law enforcement continued to hope it would somehow be able to solve violent crimes via optography, although more than a few medical experts cast aspersions. In early 1880 one Manchester, England doctor came forward immediately and threw cold water on a reported theory: “The theory expressed in this morning’s paper is quite erroneous. It is quite impossible to form any judgment from a photograph so taken.” Although complimentary of Kühne’s research, it had yet to be proven possible for a human retina to produce an image. Still, the doctor was hopeful more research would bring optography “to a much more perfect state.”94
The topic would come up from time to time over the years, although one wonders what was to be gained in the case of the Brown murders which occurred in September 1879 in West Winchester, Ontario. Clark Brown, the oldest son, had been found guilty of brutally murdering his father and sister. Clark Brown was hanged for the deed, but in January 1880 the bodies were exhumed so that photographs of their eyes might be taken to determine if someone else had committed the murders. The father’s eyes showed nothing and surmised that he had been killed in the dark. However, experts claimed to have observed images on the little girl’s retina.
Shockingly, the two objects were believed to be Clark and his mother. In late 1879 another witness had come forward who implicated the mother, alleging she had conspired with another woman to kill her husband. The plot thickened!
Authorities were hopeful of finding proof and arrested the mother, the supposition being Clark and his mother had killed the father and the little girl had seen the crime before she was killed. Clearly, “the whole case reads like one of Edgar Allen Poe’s romances of crime and mystery”, one newspaper opined.95
The topic came up yet again in conjunction with the infamous “Jack the Ripper” crimes after a British newspaper suggested the possibility of an incriminating image imprinted on the retina of victim Annie Chapman.
PHOTOGRAPHY AND THE WHITECHAPEL MURDERS
Commenting on the fact that Dr. Bagster Phillips, the police-surgeon who was called as a witness in reference to the murder of Annie Chapman, was asked as to the possibility of obtaining a clue to the murderer by photographing the eyes of the dead woman, and that he gave no hopes of any useful result, the Photographic News says – Although we may pretty confidently say that photographs of the eyes of the murdered woman would have been useless, there can be no doubt whatever that a series of photographs of the body and of the mutilations ought to have been taken, and in the face of these it would have been difficult to conceal essential facts. It is to be hoped that even now the camera will be brought into requisition, especially as there are several experienced anatomists who are also competent photographers.96
The possibility of solving crimes with optography came up more than once in ensuing years as references were woven into works of fiction. Rudyard Kipling inserted the idea of taking an optogram of a dead man’s eye “with a Kodak camera”97 in his short story entitled, “At the End of the Passage” (1891). Jules Verne and James Joyce would also utilize the concept in early twentieth century writings.
So prevalent was the lingering hope that one day someone might discover a way to extract an incriminating image from a victim’s retina, it became common practice in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to photograph the eyes. Police weren’t taking any chances and perhaps criminals didn’t either, at least as long as the hope for breakthrough persisted.
In 1927 Constable P.C. Gutteridge was shot and killed in the East End of London. After discovering shots had been fired through each eye, Scotland Yard investigators wondered whether the murderer had done it out of superstition to ensure the man’s retina would not reveal incriminating evidence to police.
Thus, in 1894 the headline “In a Dead Woman’s Eye” wasn’t at all unusual. Jamestown photographer Fred Marsh took credit for the idea of examining Mrs. Shearman’s eyes. Subsequent reports indicated with the assistance of a powerful microscope “an apparently big man [was] presented, with bushy whiskers, and wearing a long overcoat. The trousers appear[ed] to be badly wrinkled.” Unfortunately, no distinct, identifiable features were observed – “no impression was discoverable”.98
Optography was eventually debunked as nothing more than pseudo-science at best, despite renewed attempts in 1975 to once again explore the possibilities. Today, it’s merely discussed as an obscure oddity.
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