After Esperanto and Ido…Esperanto?

Auguste Forel
Ant expert and temperance
advocate

The Butte Daily Bulletin got that one little detail wrong when they reported on March 9, 1920 that a solution had been found to the Ido schism. At this point, Ido had been introduced just over twelve years before, and there was probably no chance for reconciliation of the two movements.

The Daily Bulletin names one of the people involved in this, but it turns out that he wasn’t the main person. The article makes it clear that Auguste Forel is the “honorary president” of the new organization. He wasn’t running things, but they figured that his name would look really good on the letterhead. He was, however, one of those figures with something of a mixed legacy. On the one hand, he argued for world peace, female suffrage, disarmament, on the other hand, he argued for the sterilizing or euthanizing those with mental handicaps[1] or of certain races.[2] He was also a leader in the temperance movement and an important member of the International Good Templars. His reputation is clearly sufficiently redeemed (at least for the Swiss) that he appears on the Swiss 100-franc note.

---

You can follow my blog on Twitter (@impofthediverse) or on Facebook. If you like this post, share it with your friends. If you have a comment just for me, e-mail me at impofthediverse@gmail.com.

---

This blog runs solely on ego! Follow this blog! Comment on this post! Let me know that you want to read more of it!

The Broader Battle of the WCTU

Diana by Augustus
Saint-Gaudens. Thirteen
feet of smut!

If the Women’s Christian Temperance Union got everything they wanted, the United States would be a different place today.[1] A much more repressive place. We have the Women’s Christian Temperance Union to thank for Prohibition (thanks a lot, ladies), but it looks like we got off easy. An article in the September 30, 1894, New York Sun makes it clear that their ambitions went far beyond just alcohol. There doesn’t seem to be anything that they wouldn’t complain about.

It’s a long article, but in the end, I decided to include the whole thing, mainly to get the smug statements of Mrs. Martin. Mrs. Martin seems (by her own statements, at least) to have been quite involved in the late nineteenth century reform movements. The WTCU was active in the suffrage moment, and found that the United States Brewers Association was funding the anti-suffrage side.[0] [0]: As noted in the Wikipedia article on the WCTU.

As the article shows, politics (even the politics of temperance) can make strange bedfellows, particularly when there’s mission creep involved.

---

You can follow my blog on Twitter (@impofthediverse) or on Facebook. If you like this post, share it with your friends. If you have a comment just for me, e-mail me at impofthediverse@gmail.com.

---

This blog runs solely on ego! Follow this blog! Comment on this post! Let me know that you want to read more of it!

Templars Considered Esperanto

No booze at this party

Not the Knights Templar of the medieval period, but (according to Wikipedia), a temperance organization modeled on Freemasonry. The Washington Times reported on its convention on June 4, 1908. We can assume this was no drunken bash. Their meeting place is listed as the Pythian Temple, which was the meeting place for yet another fraternal organization, The Knights of Pythias, itself founded in Washington D.C.

The main thrust of the meeting was to move forward on a proposal that the movement be neutral on the religion of its members. The organization's web site makes no reference of any sort about religion. Most chapters seem to be in Europse, though there seem to be no chapters in France or Italy. The religious neutrality part seems to have gone through.

---

You can follow my blog on Twitter (@impofthediverse) or on Facebook. If you like this post, share it with your friends. If you have a comment just for me, e-mail me at impofthediverse@gmail.com.

---

This blog runs solely on ego! Follow this blog! Comment on this post! Let me know that you want to read more of it!