Saturday, September 17, 2016

Rev. George Chalmers Richmond 1870-1938 -- Deposed Voice of Social Conscience at the end of the Gilded Age of Greed


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[​IMG] Public Ledger 8 June 1915

This discovery of a remarkable Christian preacher, an Episcopalian most of the time, came when I posted an image of poor children playing in a cleared away precious space of ancient gravestones in a churchyard in lower Kensington, home to the poor then, for use as a playground. 

The local newspaper and many local newspapers were out to shame the city in spending more in taxes on public space, and along with other social engineers who were pushing for decent playing spots for children outside of Dickensian school buildings designed without schoolyards and the need in general for neighborhoods to have more breathing room (clean air) to relieve the general squalor of their lives.  

There are pictures of the city putting playgrounds under railroad viaducts around this time among other places to illustrate the needs and lack of living space in the teeming slums of Philly at the beginning of the twentieth century. The long term solution, a temporary fix was to dig up the bones of many ancient county graveyards in the 1950s and 1960s for living space in the inner city for playgrounds, supermarkets and parking lots at Universities, Temple in particular.

Back on the topic of the image of children playing in an unidentified playground - I posted on a Philly history forum and a native to the area as a youth questioned its exact location, which took a little bit of discussion and research among some forum members to determine that the labeling of the address not totally accurate and that the actual space was behind the St. John’s P.E. Church of the Northern Liberties there. 

Northern Liberties is the old legal geographic title, like “Badlands” (no law or order) north of the official Philadelphia city limits within the then unincorporated in contrast to a present day united city of Philadelphia County. It was there that the famous Know Nothing riots and or anti-Catholic, anti-immigrant riots in the 1840s took place.

An aside on history, those riots took place because the various public entities north of the city had no police force. That the local county deputy of the Northern Liberties called on Philadelphia City to send in cops to help with the social unrest, but the Northern Liberties had not paid its bill from the City for the last round of police aid, the City refused without pay and go, and thus a famous page of American and Philadelphia history gets labeled as anti-Catholic because a few Catholic churches got burned down in the riots along with a lot of other secular domestic real estate etc.

Image of the graveyard below.


 Graveyard - 3rd and Brown - Public Ledger 2 June 1917


Well one of the posters ran into what at first looked like a crackpot eccentric rector of this era who on his diaspora away from so-called east coast civilization managed to stir up a hornets nest in Politics in Wyoming with his bizarre attitudes of social justice in the gospels attributed to the ancient preacher Jesus. And this forum member posted an article from the NYT archives. 

Apparently, Rev. Richmond had quite a following having once been posted as a cleric in NYC among other places in his long and varied career. He seemed to be one of those truth tellers or prophets that Christianity no longer has any need of in the present modern day Wharton Global Spreadsheet corporate set up of global religion for profit Inc.

Upon further research, a good man, a real man, a mensch in the pulpit was got rid of by Bishop Rhinelander of the Pennsylvania Diocese as payback by Richmond’s many local and national rich enemies in exchange for Rhinelander's recent crony appointment to that office. (Thirty silver dimes?)


https://www.amazon.it/Richmond-Ecclesiastical-Trial-Charge-Triers/dp/1154559017

“Rev. George Chalmers Richmond Had Been Rector of Old St. John's Episcopal Church, Philadelphia, for six years, when in December, 1914, he was presented for trial ordered by Bishop Philip M. Rhinelander on fourteen charges .Ten of These related to matters connected with Mr. Richmond's conduct of the pastorate of St. John's, and four had to do with private and public criticism of Bishop Rhinelander in regard to His lack of interest in the Gospel Adapting to modern social and industrial problems .The great fact to be Noted is this, the man who originated the charges and engineered the presentment - Francis A. Lewis - was the Bishop's private counsel.Not a single member of Mr. Richmond's parish signed the presentment, and not a single member of any adjoining parish had anything to do with Bringing on the trial.In November, 1915, a verdict was rendered, the triers finding Mr. Richmond "guilty" on charges Those Relating to His criticism of the Bishop, but acquitting him on all the others.Also it might be Stated That the laymen who signed the presentment were personal friends of Francis A. Lewis, and testified on the stand That they signed at his request, without reading the original charges.Mr. Richmond was suspended from priestly functions for one year.Hardly had a verdict in the first trial Been given When Bishop Rhinelander (Francis A. Lewis being His private counsel) allowed Mr. Richmond to be presented for a second time trial on 140 charges, Which later were reduced to 126, Involving 46 issues of fact.Some of These charges were exceedingly foolish…”


Here some newspaper research etc. on this deposed cleric of Philly of ancient times at the tail end of the then age of greed in the fading before WWI, Gilded Age.


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Rev. George Chalmers Richmond Attacks Mayor Reyburn - Syracuse NY Post Standard 14 March 1910



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Rev. George Chalmers Richmond Attacks Decadence of Gould - Drexel Wedding NYC - Niagra Falls Gazette April 1910


Niagra Falls Gazette 25 April 1910





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Famous Sayings - Rev. George Chalmers Richmond - Brooklyn Daily Eagle 12 Aug 1911




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Rev. George Chalmers Richmond Attacks Racial Killing in Coatesville Pa. - Phila. Inquirer 21 August 1911


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Rev. George Chalmers Richmond's View of Remarriage after Divorce - John Jacob Astor IV - Mechanicville NY Saturday Evening Mercury 16 Sept 1911

 

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INQUIRER 15 JAN 1938



NEW YORK POST 15 JAN 1938


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Rev. George Chalmers Richmond 1870 -1938 -- Yale Alumni Obituary Record 1937-1938








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Monday, September 5, 2016

Child Labor 1900s USA – Photos of Lewis Wickes Hine 1874-1940



Wednesday May 28, 2014

Child Labor 1900s USA – Photos of Lewis Wickes Hine 1874-1940


"At the Maggioni Canning Company in Port Royal, South Carolina, children shucked oysters for 4 hours before a half day of school, returning for 3 more hours of work after school."


Photos: Lewis Wickes Hine 1874-1940 (Public Domain)



"January 1909. Tifton, Georgia. Workers in the Tifton Cotton Mills. All these children were working or helping, 125 in all."






"Force working in West Point Cotton Mills. West Point, Miss, May 1911"



"All these pick shrimp at the Peerless Oyster Co. I had to take photo while bosses were at dinner as they refused to permit the children to be in photos. Out of 60 workers, 15 were apparently under 12 years old. Bay St. Louis, Miss, March 1911"



"Eight year old Jennie Camillo lives in West Maniyunk, Pa. (near Philadelphia). For this summer she has picked cranberries. This summer she is at Theodore Budd's Bog at Turkeytown, N.J. This is the fourth week of school in Philadelphia and people will stay here two weeks more, September 1910"



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Wednesday, August 24, 2016

Empires Crash and Burn After They Rise


A great deal of main stream history is about the rise of empires. Much about the fall of empires is usually related to the Roman Empire.  A little about the Persian Empire, the Mongolian empire is also out there on so called history cable channels.

But speaking mainly about History type channels that talk about the American Revolution and the Civil War and World Wars One and Two are all about how we won. It is so easy in retrospect and in the comfort of an armchair to plot the strategies of success in hindsight. 

Those strategies in many cases were trial and error and paid for in blood and suffering by those directly involved as in an army or a navy or collateral damage as in civilian casualties and death. 

It is funny how a military word like Collateral has worked its way into our lexicon in recent years, with our military involvement overseas in rotting sand piles parked over vast reservoirs of petroleum etc.

Some places like Syria for example has fallen apart because of its location next to falling apart government and geography in Iraq, Afghanistan etc. There is also the falling apart of places like the smaller countries on the rim of the Saudi Peninsula where religion mixed with politics is all there is or has ever been since the Prophet Mohammed found the glue to bring some of the warring parties and tribes together temporarily and centuries ago.  

Syria has no oil and many are saying that the population fell apart over hunger caused by the mythical Global Climate Change denied by the Right wing pols.

On a tangent, the Islamic world has different and or subtle-ly different ideas of the sacred and the profane. A mosque is a place of prayer and not a temple filled with relics and statues as in Christianity and Hinduism. The building is used as a public place when not in use for prayer.  This in not unlike the early use of Churches setting up in the corners of Roman basilicas which were originally covered markets to conduct commerce or court business out of the elements like rain or snow.

I saw in the news recently that the Saudi government in charge of Mecca was going to move the Tomb of the Prophet to accommodate a larger space for tourists to parade around the Kaaba. Nothing sacred in a tomb in the founder of a world religion?

Anyway, watching one of these pseudo history channels, they were throwing in a search for the real Mount Sinai trying to prove that the bible is correct in that there really was a Mt. Sinai etc. And then it hits me how the Christians have to agree with the Jews on their history in order to shore up Christian mythology. 

But the real crux of a religion history archeological type programming on a military history channel also goes to prove that Israel has the right to exist based on the man-made myths in the Hebrew – Greek Book aka the Bible.

When following Moses setting up his empire and taking the land away from the natives by force and blood it was because his desert god told him to do it. Whatever.

Nobody ever mentions that ancient Israel as a political entity crashed and burned and was a failed almost extinct religion by the time that the emperor god Constantine or one of his committees resurrected the party line of the old religion to prop up another new designer religion based on one of the later prophets called Jesus who may or may not have existed around the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 C.E..

Same thing with the History Channel constantly churning out WWII footage about how great and smart and powerful we (USA) were in defeating the Axis Powers. The obsession though I think in all this WWII history stuff now that 95% WWII veterans are dead is to show how to start an empire like Hitler. How easy it is to lie and destroy and hurt and kill 50 million people who directly and immediately indirectly died making his egotistical idea and dream building a temporary political reality. He coulda been a contender – woulda, coulda, shoulda.

Now where did he go wrong is a very real theme of these shows shown on cable channels owned by strange dark right wing billionaires who want their own little strange dark empires which they are a building at the expense of the greater good of all the people in a democracy?

Just saying. That obsession with the building of empires does not prevent them from eventually falling slowly or crashing and burning in plain sight for all to see.  I prefer the crash and burn method of downward spiral for tin plated political and financial gods who have no life outside of their selfish dreams and obsession and mental disorders such as Narcissism etc.



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Sunday, July 24, 2016

Tomeaphilia - Worship of Big Books (Idols) and Not Necessarily Their Contents = By Fundamentalist Christian and Islamic Religionists






Tomeaphilia - tome-a-phil-i-a - noun

Worship of Big Books (idols) and Not Necessarily Their Contents = by Fundamentalist Christian and Islamic Religionists 

(inspired, with a small "i", by a tweet regarding evangelical trolls by media personality John Fugalsang.)


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Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Charlie Chaput’s Hellfire Club Convention – The Napa Institute - 2016




Cardinal or is it Archbishop Chaput of Philly is on or off his medications with this or that PR statement, by this or that mass closing of Philly inner-city schools and churches, or getting together with the boys in the absolute privacy of a wine cooler bunker in California, is finally breaking up, sobering up after one hell of a party past its closing date Jul 6-10. Worth every penny, tax-free btw.

Some honored (rumored) guests at Chaput’s Hellfire Club Party this year above.

When my memory was better, I think I was a bit too obsessed with the buggers that run the Catholic Church in Rome and America. I see from reading an old blog that was above my pay grade not in intelligence but in evolved personal belief that hit me with a hard realization that I did not belong there, while being hit also with the fact that the old boys of the RC church that would rather protect a bugger priest / nun than send him or her off to jail for abusing children, that the old “Religious Freedom”, “Religious Liberty” good ‘ole boys  of the American RC hierarchy are meeting, have been meeting, for a drinking fest in honor of one of the Founding Fathers – of Benjamin Franklin, networking, drunking it up, whoring it up in imitation of the “HellFire Club” from his days as unofficial American ambassador to the Court of Saint James in England in the eighteenth century.

That Cardinal Chaput of Philadelphia was a founding father of this RC Hellfire Club in Napa Valley – wine country in California – “The Napa Institute” was founded for the extreme uber-nazi-like wing of American RC Hierarchs to sit around and bitch about how Clergy don’t get any respect anymore – just like Rodney Dangerfield. At least with old Rodney there was punch line and a giggle. But these guys get together to swill Speaker Paul Ryan’s (a good “catolick” btw) private stock of $350 a bottle Lobbyist vino. 

That and celebrating Latin Masses in “Catacombs” (tunnels / wine cellars) and dealing in innocent prepubescent games of “grab ass” with or sans the tighty whiteys just like the good old days of Friday nights after five in the seminary. Wink. Nod. Gotcha!

Am reminded of the twitter hash tag for these guys favored choice for President of Donald Trump – the Napa Institute besides a private drinking club is a gathering place of writing checks to Citizens United Pacs by the Bishops in the hopes of regaining respect in America – long lost now after a decade or two of proof after proof of the incarnate evil of the #WhiningLittleBitch(es) in purple and red dresses to borrow a hash tag favored by the comedian Bill Maher for Donald #WhinyLittleBitch to gather funds for the GOP and other evangelical Hatriot groups Etc.


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Saturday, July 9, 2016

Nat Turners Ghost Shows Up in Dallas? - Military Tactics - Robots - Drones - Habeas Corpus




Habeas Corpus – Latin Term = You Have The Body

I am really getting tired that the national psyche has to adjust itself everytime some sissy Confederate(s) in Rebel State(s) is having a hissy fit or a presidential assassination or mass murder / domestic Terror situation - we, the rest of us, have to adjust and or be reeducated by the Media (Little Mao’s Red Book?) every time Nat Turner’s ugly, not lazy, black ghost rears its head in the form of verboten phrases like “Nat Turner Lives”, Black (Armed) Panthers, or BLACK LIVES MATTER. (Blue Lies Matter phrase all locked up on Twitter for some reason, some freedom in the “land of free speech” btw)

They killed Kennedy in Dallas near my birthday in 1963. I say they because only an idiot can believe that one lone patsy part-time C IA operative e like Lee Harvey Oswald with a $12 war surplus mail-order rifle could serve up Annie Oakley miracle shooting style perfection in the execution of the Yankee Catholic President stupid enough to take secret service advice to roll around Dallas town in corrupt Texas in an open convertible.

I have to wonder what happened to the three people they picked up as suspects in the Cop Killings the other day in Dallas??? The "Spare" suspects ready to be served up to the public. 

I do not celebrate the death of any cop or any civilian innocent of any crime or just standing around on a balmy summer’s eve watching and or protecting the public’s right to peaceably to assemble and protest the militarization of our domestic police forces still being - using occupying Armies Tactics as in Iraq and Afghanistan in a city near you etc.

But hey. The suspect they had cornered, had bombs (or so he was quoted as saying) or so they said – They – the echo chamber media – that you cannot wait out, starve out a suspect – overtime – change of shift due etc. – global spreadsheet considerations – in the solving of any business problem just like the police business of late in the United States. Bottom line manager. Bottom Line Matters or no bonus!

So why not serve up Habeas Corpus to the screaming slave, former slave(?) with the recommended for slave owners NRA (endorsed only for whites btw) weapon of choice WMD - an armed, not unarmed god forbid ROBOT / GROUND DRONE – why not - not serve up Habeas Corpus for a hostage situation that ends not like any I have heard of before. 

A NEW PRECIDENT? 

Serving up Dallas style JFK justice before quitting time on the new (not pre-1963) Dallas Police force. lol 

I understand the want and need for immediate revenge against a bastard that breaks the rules and rips a hole in the comfort zones, white burb bubble idea of ideal white domestic tranquility mentioned in the preamble to the Constitution.  

I also understand why Lincoln suspended Habeas Corpus in time of War. 

But is RoboCop the new judge, jury along with being the arresting officer in any incident including bringing the bomb squad and or the bomb drone in for mass murder / hostage situations and or broken tail lights on colored people’s automobiles?

BOOM! 

Justice Served! 

UP on a platter full of visible pork grease for the vegans out there wanting Justice? – That and Gitmo is closing – no room for the Nat Turner Types. Wink. Nod.


* (Drone has become a word for a flying toy (or stable mobile) for men in the military (Local Cops) to blow up ragheads (or uncharged civilians) at a distance in the great global land and asset steal of Big Biz Inc.?)

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P.S.

In dissecting the corpse of a domestic terrorist like Micah Xavier Johnson it is important that the American People know that he once pushed a “like” button on Facebook on the New latest version of the Black Panthers or some other Organized Slaves for Freedom or Respect Movement, remember that Like must mean LOVE and we can safely assume that anybody contaminated with the idea of truly free slaves from Africa who became instantly “lazy” the day that Railroad Lawyer of Abraham Lincoln sold them the idea of freedom and Welfare dependence on the state… Well you know the rest of White Big Brothers Spiel for Freedom for ALL ( or just us whites in the burbs ) etc. ;-)




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