100 Years Ago: 29-Aug-1913
You’ve probably familiar with August, 1914… You may even have read the book of the same name, or the other famous one, “The Guns of August”. As we draw closer to the centennial anniversary of those times, I find myself wondering what life looked like to people 100 years ago…
In August, 1913, radio and airplanes were new, and there were no such things as television, computers, or jet engines. Electrons had only been identified as particles 16 years before. Woodrow Wilson was President (the 28th), and the Panama Canal was almost done. Many countries were still ruled by monarchs; that was still pretty much the norm. (Tsar Nicholas II in Russia and Kaiser WIlhelm II in Germany.)
Many high-ranking officers of the British Royal Navy were still men who had started their careers on wooden sailing ships with muzzle-loading guns, even if the new ships of the day were steel, powered with steam. And 100 years ago yesterday, the Imperial Japanese Navy battlecruiser “Kongo” put to sea from Portsmouth, England for the first time, bound for her home in Japan -- 36,000 tons, and 8 12-inch guns, top speed 30 knots.
She would ultimately have a long and notorious career, before being sunk by a torpedo from a submarine 31 years later… but at the time she put to sea, nobody would have known any of that. She was bright and shiny and no doubt magnificent; the lead ship of her class, and one of the mightiest warships in existence on that day; and nobody knew what would happen...
In August, 1913, radio and airplanes were new, and there were no such things as television, computers, or jet engines. Electrons had only been identified as particles 16 years before. Woodrow Wilson was President (the 28th), and the Panama Canal was almost done. Many countries were still ruled by monarchs; that was still pretty much the norm. (Tsar Nicholas II in Russia and Kaiser WIlhelm II in Germany.)
Many high-ranking officers of the British Royal Navy were still men who had started their careers on wooden sailing ships with muzzle-loading guns, even if the new ships of the day were steel, powered with steam. And 100 years ago yesterday, the Imperial Japanese Navy battlecruiser “Kongo” put to sea from Portsmouth, England for the first time, bound for her home in Japan -- 36,000 tons, and 8 12-inch guns, top speed 30 knots.
She would ultimately have a long and notorious career, before being sunk by a torpedo from a submarine 31 years later… but at the time she put to sea, nobody would have known any of that. She was bright and shiny and no doubt magnificent; the lead ship of her class, and one of the mightiest warships in existence on that day; and nobody knew what would happen...