Today’s Almanac-March 2, 2010
It’s two-fer-Tuesday!
On March 2, 1876 Rutherford B. Hayes became the first person selected for the Presidency by a “Bi-Partisan Commission.” Hayes won the Republican nomination only after the leading candidate James G. Blaine failed in six ballots to win the majority of delegates at the party convention. A bland non-entity picked because “he offended no one,” Hayes went into the election an underdog to Democrat Samuel Tilden. And indeed he carried the popular vote by a not insignificant 250,000 vote lead our of 8.5 million ballots cast. Other presidents were elected by more slender margins. But in the Electoral College, Tilden came up just one vote shy with the results from four states-Florida, Louisiana, South Carolina, and Oregon were contested. If, as expected the electoral votes of the three states from the old Confederacy were counted for the Democrats, Tilden would be an easy victor. Fearing civil unrest if the election was determined by the Republican controlled House of Representatives, Congress decided to appoint a bi-partisan commission to decide the contested electoral votes. The commission was to be composed of 7 Republican, 7 Democrats and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, the supposedly independent David Davis in whom both parties had confidence. But before the Commission could act, Davis resigned his seat on the Court and on the Convention to take a Senate seat from Illinois. Another Justice, a Republican, replaced him on the Commission. The Commission then voted along party lines 8-7 to award all of the disputed electoral votes to Hayes. Senator James Garfield and Southern Democrats, however worked out an agreement to prevent trouble. Hayes would withdraw the last Federal troops from the South, end Reconstruction, and appoint at least one Southerner to his Cabinet. Despite the deal embittered Democrats understandably called the new president His Fraudulency.
On March 2, 1904 Theodor Seuss Geisel was born in Springfield, Massachusetts. As a college student at Dartmouth, he was suspended from extracurricular activities for drinking alcohol but continued to contribute to the campus humor magazine under his mother’s maiden name Seuss. After he graduated he started using Dr. Seuss as a pen name for a humor column in the popular magazine Judge because he intended to continue his education and become a Ph.D in literature. Marriage ended those plans, but he was already launched on a successful writing career. In addition to Judge, his work began to appear in Vanity Fair, Life, Liberty, and the top selling magazine of all, The Saturday Evening Post, often accompanied by his own whimsical illustrations. He was also an in demand advertising man whose celebrated Flit insecticide magazine ads became a cultural phenomena. His art work was used by NBC, Standard Oil and other major companies. In 1937 he published his first children’s book And to Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street. But his attention was soon drawn to the rise of European Fascism. He became a regular contributor of fiercely anti-Nazi political cartoons to the left wing New York daily newspaper PM and other publication, including, occasionally, the Industrial Worker. When the war began he contributed posters to the Treasury Department’s war bond drives and the War Production Board. In 1943 he enlisted was made commander of the animation department of the Army Air Corps First Motion Picture Unit. He made a number of humorous training films in the Private Snafu series and highly regarded propaganda films. After the war he and his wife settled in California and he turned to writing and illustrating children’s books full time. He produced a chain of award winning books from If I Ran the Zoo to How the Grinch Stole Christmas using the trisyllabic meter for his verse that would become his signature.. In response to criticism that the bland Dick and Jane readers were boring children to death and driving them away from reading his publisher urged him to write an entertaining book in basic vocabulary. The result was The Cat in the Hat which used just 220 different words and went on to become the biggest selling book in Random House history. More Beginner Books followed. He gently introduced progressive themes into his books for children including authoritarianism in Yertle the Turtle, racial equality in The Sneeches, environmentalism in The Lorax, and militarism in Butter Battle Book. In 1974 he parodied his own style in a short piece called Richard Nixon Will You Please Go Now which was reprinted nationally in Art Buchwald’s popular column. As he neared the end of his life, he wrote an adult book in his style for children You’re Only Old Once chronicling an old man’s misadventures in the health care system. Ted Geissel died after a long illness in San Diego in 1995. Dr. Seuss is immortal.