Falling Down the Thames Blog 9, 14th May 2014
A Special Year
Pick any year at random. Dig deeply enough and you will probably find some truly monumental events. For instance in 1889:
- The Eiffel Tower, the tallest structure in the world at the time, opened on February 6. On February 7, over 1200 vendors begin selling Eiffel Tower key chains.
- In 1889 Montana, Washington, North Dakota, South Dakota were each admitted into the United States of America. An anagram of the state motto of Montana, “Oro y Plata” (Gold and Silver) is “A Loopy Rat.”
- in New York city, the Wall Street Journal was first published in 1889. The WSJ currently bores 2.4 million readers, six days a week.
- In 1889 the firm Nintendo was formed as a manufacturer of playing cards. One hundred and twenty-five years later, Nintendo released new details concerning Mario Kart 8 and Super Smash Brothers. No mention was made of playing cards.
- While the year was 1889 in the rest of the world, it was 1881 in Ethiopia, where Emperor Yohannes the fourth was killed in a skirmish with Sudanese forces. He was, apparently, the last ruler of any country ever to die in battle.
- The Coca-Cola company was established at that time. Although the American Dental Association was formed thirty years earlier, its membership soared after 1889.
- In 1889 Vincent van Gogh painted Starry Night. Eighty-two years later, Don McLean used the painting as inspiration for his song Vincent. Thirty-two years after that, the song was used in an episode of The Simpsons. High art becomes popular culture becomes commercial television.
Some pretty significant things happened in 1889 related specifically to the River Thames.
- On the north shore of the Thames, near the Waterloo Bridge, the Savoy Hotel opened for business in 1889. One hundred and twenty-five years later, the Savoy can offer a room with a king-sized bed and a view of the Thames for £917 a night. This comes with complementary breakfast in the foyer.
- 1889 saw the construction of the current pier at Southend-on-Sea on the north shore of the Thames River Estuary. At over 2.1 kilometres in length, it is the longest pleasure pier in the world.
- The Woolwich Free Ferry, carrying vehicles and foot passengers the 400 metres across the Thames from Woolwich to North Woolwich, came into service in 1889. Although vehicle traffic remains high today, the passenger deck is, reportedly, normally almost empty.
- English poet Eliza Cook died in 1889. Among her best known works are Song of the Worm and Grey-eyed Mabel. Cook also wrote a poem about the Thames, which included the lines:
Yet I ever loved to dwell,
Where I heard its gushing swell,
And never skimmed its breast,
But I warmly praised and blest,
The Thames! the mighty Thames!
But for the purposes of Falling Down the Thames, the most monumental event of 1889 was the publication of Three Men in a Boat. Written by Jerome K. Jerome, it is a semi-fictitious account of a journey that Jerome made with two of his chums in a camping skiff on the River Thames between Kingston and Oxford. And in a later blog, I will describe the book which was a huge success in its day, and remains in print today.
- Glen
Photocredits: Eiffel Tower – pebblebrain22.deviantart.com; Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh – www.masterpieceofthemonth.org; Three Men In A Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) by Jerome K. Jerome – betweenthelines.in