George Rumpel (10 May 1850 – 05 June 1916) “He remained warm-hearted, fair and diplomatic. His employees liked him for this and because wealth did not deprive him of his genial, companionable attribute. Without ostentation, he was considerate of and helpful to those in unfortunate circumstances.” Berliners were rocked by the sudden death of former […] Read more…
Sorting through thousands and thousands of names With the name change vote done and over with, Aldermen Cleghorn, Hahn, Hallman, Rudell and Master winnowed the estimated 30,000 submitted names to 113. They easily tossed thousands of entries: contest rules precluded names already in use in Canada (the Post Office demanded an original name). It seems as if […] Read more…
15 May 1916: Colonel Lochead’s open letter to Berliners Regarding the reports apparently more or less generally circulated throughout the City, that the officers, NCOs, and men of the 118th Battalion mean to take an active part in the election slated for Friday, I beg to state that I myself and every other officer of […] Read more…
A ripple of excitement on the Bay of Berlin The Berlin Daily Telegraph did a mini-exposé on William Kingsley, the man behind the injunction to stop the name change vote. A riffle through recruiting office files revealed he was a socialist slacker—this allowed a nebulous tie-in to the anti-name changer group with enemy aliens. Without […] Read more…
The ladies’ ten-day recruitment campaign ended without either fanfare or an inkling of results–except to say empty bunks meant a last-ditch sign-up campaign had to be launched. Recruitment meetings continued to attract “the usual crowd” of ladies and old tigers; eligible, fit young men were nowhere to be found. Woe betides these slackers, for “they […] Read more…
Irish Uprising News from Ireland was slow and—at least at first–sparse. Apart from cut communications lines, London’s censors vetted the uprising’s details, leaving many in the dark. By the end of this week—10 days after the rebellion began—more than 100 people were killed or wounded, the street fighting subsided, and more than 1000 insurgents were […] Read more…