May 1911

May 1, 1911 (Monday)

• The United States Supreme Court ruled that the federal government, rather than the individual states, had the right to set apart lands for public use. The ruling, in Light v. United States initially applied to forest preserves, but would be extended to other federal use of land.

  May 2, 1911 (Tuesday)

• The British House of Commons approved amendments to the Parliament Bill, a provision for veto of House of Lords power, with the first reading passing 299 to 193.
• Professor Horatio W. Parker of Yale University, and former Yale professor Brian Hooker won the $10,000 prize from New York's Metropolitan Opera for an opera written and composed entirely by Americans, with Mona receiving the grand prize.

  May 3, 1911 (Wednesday)

• The German Antarctic Expedition, organized by Wilhelm Filchner, departed from Bremerhaven on the ship Deutschland. Sailing into the Weddell Sea and getting trapped by the ice there for eight months, the expedition would discover the Filchner Ice Shelf.

  May 4, 1911 (Thursday)

• The British National Insurance Bill, providing for both health insurance and unemployment insurance, was introduced by Chancellor of the Exchequer David Lloyd George. With workers paying 4d, employers 3d and the government 2d per worker per week, the system became operational on January 15, 1913, and provided sickness payments of up to 10 shillings per week during illness.

  May 5, 1911 (Friday)

• Sir George Kemp's suffrage bill passed its second reading, 255–88. The right to vote was proposed for every woman "possessed of the household qualification," excluding women servants and lodgers, and prohibited women from voting in the same constituency as their husbands.
• A report on the Haram al-Sharif incident was published, in which it revealed British excavations within the sacred compound.
• Born: Andor Lilienthal, Hungarian and Soviet chess grandmaster; in Moscow.

  May 6, 1911 (Saturday)

• The first International Hygiene Exhibition opened in Dresden, and attracted five million visitors to the German city.
• The Colorado Senate adjourned after seven ballots with no replacement for the late Senator Charles J. Hughes Jr., who had died on January 11. Colorado had only one U.S. Senator for more than two years, until Charles S. Thomas took office on January 20, 1913.
• Died: George Maledon, 80, nicknamed "The Prince of Hangmen", for carrying out most of the 79 executions at Fort Smith, Arkansas, as ordered by "The Hanging Judge", Isaac C. Parker.

  May 7, 1911 (Sunday)

• Porfirio Díaz issued a "manifesto" declaring that he would eventually resign as President of Mexico, but not until hostilities by Francisco I. Madero's rebel armies ceased, declaring that he would step down "when, according to the dictates of my conscience, I am sure my resignation will not be followed by anarchy."
• Born: Ishirō Honda, Japanese film director, in Yamagata Prefecture.

  May 8, 1911 (Monday)

• In what has been described as the birth of naval aviation, Captain Washington Irving Chambers of the United States Navy awarded a contract to Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company for the Curtiss A-1 Triad.
• The Chinese Grand Council was abolished, replaced by ten member constitutional cabinet, with Yikuang becoming the first Premier in China's history.
• China and the United Kingdom signed an agreement whereby the Chinese would phase out production of opium over a 7-year period, and the British would phase out exports of opium from India to China at the same rate.
• The House of Lords approved Lord Lansdowne's proposal for reconstitution of the House of Lords on its first reading.
• Germany issued a warning to France that an attempted occupation of the Moroccan city of Fes would be considered a violation of a treaty between the two nations.
• Born:
• *Robert Johnson, American blues musician, and one of the original inductees of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; ranked by Rolling Stone magazine in 2008 as fifth greatest guitarist of all time; in Hazlehurst, Mississippi.
• *Rudolf Flesch, American educator whose 1955 book Why Johnny Can't Read successfully advocated a change from sight-word reading back to phonics; in Vienna, Austria.

  May 9, 1911 (Tuesday)

• The American Psychoanalytic Association was founded, at an organizational meeting in Baltimore.
• A fire broke out at the Empire Palace Theatre in Edinburgh, Scotland, during a performance of the variety and magic show of Sigmund Neuberger, who billed himself as "The Great Lafayette." The audience of 1,500 was evacuated in four minutes, but eleven members of the troupe, including Lafayette himself, died in the blaze.
• Professor Boris Rosing of the Saint Petersburg State Institute of Technology, assisted by his student Vladimir Zworykin, demonstrated the transmission of a scanned image-- "four luminous bands" on to a cathode ray tube. Zworykin would build upon Rosing's discoveries in the development of television.
• Johann Orth, formerly known as Archduke John Salvator of Austria, was declared legally dead 20 years after he had disappeared.
• The body of Elsie Paroubek, the subject of an exhaustive three-state manhunt by Chicago police over the four weeks since her disappearance in April, was found in a Lockport, Illinois drainage canal. Her photograph was published on the front page of the Chicago Daily News and would become an inspiration to amateur artist-author Henry Darger, who would make her a central figure in his immense fantasy novel The Story of the Vivian Girls.
• Died: Thomas Wentworth Higginson, 87, American minister and abolitionist who had commanded the 1st South Carolina Colored Infantry Regiment, a Union army regiment composed of African-American soldiers, during the Civil War.

  May 10, 1911 (Wednesday)

• At 2:30 pm, General Juan Navarro surrendered the city of Ciudad Juárez to the rebel forces of Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, who had attacked the city in defiance of Francisco Madero. The fall of Juarez was the first loss of territory to the rebels. Madero proclaimed himself President the next day.
• Born:
• *Bel Kaufman, German-born American author, in Berlin.
• *Alexander D. Goode, U.S. Army Chaplain who was one of the Four Chaplains to give up their lives as the USAT Dorchester sank on February 3, 1943; in Columbus, Ohio.

  May 11, 1911 (Thursday)

• The United States Senate failed, after seven ballots, to elect a replacement for the office of president pro tempore, two weeks after the death of Senator William P. Frye of Maine. Senator Jacob H. Gallinger of New Hampshire failed to win majority support. The deadlock was broken by an agreement to rotate the position among five different U.S. Senators until the 62nd U.S. Congress session ended in 1913.
• Born:
• *Phil Silvers, American TV actor and comedian, as Philip Silver in Brooklyn.
• *Doodles Weaver, American TV actor and comedian, in Los Angeles.
• *Jeanne Behrend, American composer, in Philadelphia.

  May 12, 1911 (Friday)

• The American steamship SS Merida sank after it was struck by another vessel, the Admiral Farragut off of the coast of Cape Charles in the U.S. state of Virginia. Although the 131-member crew and the 188 passengers were all rescued, SS Merida sank with a cargo that included 372 silver bars and a cargo worth two million dollars at the time, equivalent to $65 million more than 110 years later. Subsequent attempts to salvage the cargo would recover very little.
• At the request of the parliament of Persia, William Morgan Shuster, a 34-year-old American lawyer, arrived in what is now Iran to manage the nation's economy as its Treasurer General. Shuster was forced to leave eight months later after the Russian Empire sent troops to prevent him from seizing the assets of the former royal family.

  May 13, 1911 (Saturday)

• An Imperial Decree was issued in China, annexing the railroad lines from Hankou to Guangzhou and Chongqing, in advance of the receipt of the first installment of a loan from foreign banks to construct a new railroad.
• Born:
• *Wayne Hays, U.S. Representative from Ohio and onetime chairman of the House Administration Committee until scandal forced his resignation; in Bannock, Ohio.
• *Maxine Sullivan, American blues singer, in Homestead, Pennsylvania.

  May 14, 1911 (Sunday)

• Prince Lij Iyasu was proclaimed as Emperor Iyasu V of Ethiopia, referred to at the time as Abyssinia.

  May 15, 1911 (Monday)

• The United States Supreme Court issued its ruling in Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey v. United States, upholding a judgment that the Standard Oil Company held a monopoly in violation of American antitrust law, and ordered that the Standard Oil be split into competing companies within six months. Among the 38 companies created were Standard Oil of New Jersey and Standard Oil of New York, which merged in 1999 as ExxonMobil; Standard Oil of Indiana, Standard Oil of California, Atlantic Refining and Continental Oil Company.
• The Parliament Act 1911, nicknamed the "Veto Bill" because it gave the right of the lower house of Parliament to reverse decisions by the House of Lords, passed the British House of Commons on its third reading, 362–241, and moved on to the House of Lords.
• Born: Max Frisch, Swiss author, in Zürich.
• Died: James Smith, 53, Chairman of Manufacturing Committee of Standard Oil Company.

  May 16, 1911 (Tuesday)

• A group of 303 Chinese and five Japanese immigrants were killed in the Torreón massacre when the forces of the Mexican Revolution, led by Francisco I. Madero's brother Emilio Madero, took the city of Torreón from the Federales. After a three-day defense, government troops departed and twelve hours of rioting began. Among the victims was Dr. J.W. Lim, a wealthy Chinese-Mexican banker, who was dragged through the streets before being shot. In all, 316 Chinese residents were murdered during the revolution, and China's ambassador to Mexico, Shung As Sune, demanded compensation from the Mexican government of 33,600,000 pesos, worth $16,800,000 for the loss of lives and property.
• Henry Lewis Stimson was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as the new U.S. Secretary of War, four days after the resignation of Jacob M. Dickinson.
• Died: Margaret A. Weller, 68, the first person to learn how to use the QWERTY keyboard. Mrs. Weller, the wife of a court reporter, tested the prototype of the typewriter invented by C. Latham Sholes in 1867.