Luftwaffe Puking Machines

     Members of some earliest generations -like mine - may remember Jimmy Edwards, an English comedian which a huge handlebar moustache best remembered for his performances in Whack-O! as a drunken, devious, misfit of a headmaster who loved swinging the cane. The fantastic moustache was, in fact, grown to disguise the scars of his injuries in an R.A.F. plane crash during World War II. Nevertheless, he continued in the R.A.F. for its final drive into Germany, during which period the following discovery was made.

The Crime of a Cripple?

     This is a story I couldn't let pass. It was published on Easter Day, 5 April 2026 in the Sunday Mail (Brisbane, Australia) p 33. It was written while the Iran War was in progress.

Forget Iran, amputee cornhole killer's yarn of the week

by Rory Gibson

    One of the casualties of war is non-war news. Because missile barrages tend to hog the headlines, more interesting stuff can get lost in the fog. Consequently you may have missed a ripper yarn involving a bloke called Dayton Webber. One report about Webber carried the most intriguing headline I've seen in years: "US quadruple amputee cornhole pro suspected of murder had a dark side, ex-girlfriend claims."

Of Rugs and Socks

      Things were pretty grim in the occupied Netherlands during the Second World War. One woman needed money, and the only item she had to spare was an old patchwork rug whose wool was still bright and strong. It consisted of twenty-five knitted squares, two of each colour and one spare, so she set about pulling apart the wool of two of the squares, from which she knitted a pair of bed socks. Now, where to find a buyer? Going door to door, she located one woman who was only too eager to purchase them. So she went back, unravelled another couple of squares, and knitted another pair of socks. The woman bought them as well. In fact, she was happy to purchase all the socks she produced, even the single sock knitted from the last square

      After the war, both independently migrated to Australia, and one day they happened to meet in the main street of Hobart, Tasmania, and the sock maker finally learnt what the second woman had done with those socks. She had meticulously pulled them apart, and used the wool to make a patchwork rug!

Source: Dianne J Taylor (2025), Anna's War, Rivetpress Press. This is a novel for teenagers. However, in the notes at the back the author explained that the incident was based on a true story she had heard on a walking holiday in Tasmania thirty years before.

The Dangers of Dating a Twin

      There must be something special about having an identical twin which we singletons can never experience. For a start, it usually means having an automatic best friend. You can also tell stories of mistaken identity. More to the point, there were times when the both of you decided to create confusion over who was who.

Those Hardy Pioneer Women

      Don't ever let anyone tell you that women can't be tough if they need to be. And the ones who needed it most were the pioneer women. Imagine giving birth when your husband is away, and your only midwives are two native girls, one of whom was crippled and the other spoke no English. Or what about fighting off a horde of savages when you are nine months pregnant and your husband is away? Yet these were the sort of things experienced by the wives of the early white settlers in the Channel Country, that vast stretch of desert in the corner of Queensland next to the South Australian border which, during rains, turns into a vast network of rivulets and channels. (At the time of writing, it is just recovering from extensive flooding.)

Gotta Sell Those Hats!

       There's always another day in Tahiti. Apropos of the natives' light regard for time, Mrs. Winkelstroetter tells us of the boat from the Austral Islands that was about to return to that group when an old lady objected:

     "But, Captain, just wait a little. I have ten hats to sell yet."

     So he postponed sailing until the next day.

     But she still had seven hats to sell. Sailing was put off from day to day. Each morning the captain and passengers would assemble ready to depart. The old lady would complain and the boat would lie over. So it went for a week.

     "Now really," the captain said, "I must sail. Haven't you sold all your hats?"

     "All but one - but it is a very ugly one and nobody will buy it."

     The captain pulled out ten francs.

     "I'll buy it myself,"

     He did, and thanks to this prompt and decisive action on his part, the boat sailed only a week late.

Reference:  Willard Price (1955), Adventures in Paradise, quoted in The Wild World Magazine Oct 1956 (Australia), Sept. 1956 (UK), p x

The Danger of Dealing with a Witch

      Unrequited love! One of life's great frustrations! Haven't we all been a position whereby a little love magic would come in handy - preferably a type which could not be used by our rival, or against us? (That's the trouble, of course, with magic: it works both ways.) In the 1920s journalist, W. B. Seabrook went to Haiti to investigate Voodoo, and reported on how a young man called Paul, besotted with a woman who had rejected him, asked his grandmother, Maman Célie for help. In response, she ground into powder a dead hummingbird, all the time chanting prayers or spells, added a few dried drops of her grandson's blood and semen, plus the pollen of jungle flowers, and placed it in a pouch made from the scrotum of a billy goat. Now the fun part: how was he going to get the object of his affection to eat or drink the stuff? 

A Noise Annoys a Caterpillar

      Caterpillars! They descended as a ravenous plague on the Catskill Mountains of New York State in the years 1897-9. Green worms, or tree caterpillars the farmers called them, as they watched in stupefied impotence while their fruit and maple trees were transformed into bare branch skeletons by the voracious pests. Nothing, it seemed, could save them from ruin. Nothing the scientists could suggest made any difference. Where was the Pied Piper when you needed him most?

Come Home; It's Time for Your Execution!

      Here's a scenario: you've committed murder, and have been sentenced to death. Alas! The facilities for your execution are not yet in place, so you are released on parole. We are talking about the original meaning of the term: you give your word (parole in French) that you will return on the required date - sort like bail without the money - and off you go. You leave the country and become a sporting celebrity. Then, after three years, you receive the summons: it is time for you to return home for your execution. What do you do?

     Well, if you were a Choctaw, there is no issue to discuss. You gave your word. Your word is your bond. And death is preferable to dishonour.

"Is This Not the Carpenter?"

     No matter how important you become, the people you will find hardest to impress are those you grew up with, who knew you when you were both snotty-nosed kids, and who watched you grow into an average Joe. Thus, when Jesus returned to His hometown of Nazareth, the reactions of the locals were: "Is this not the carpenter?" (Mk 6:3) or "... the carpenter's son?" (Matt. 13.55). So that is how we know how Jesus and St. Joseph earned their living. It also cast light on other passages. Thus, although "My yoke is easy" (Matt. 11:30) has a predominantly spiritual meaning, we should not forget that it came from a professional carpenter who once took pride in crafting yokes which did not chafe the ox.

     But does anyone have an idea what Jesus' or Joseph's workshop looked like? That famous, and mawkish, painting by John Millais really depicts a modern carpenter's workshop. Not to worry! Until about a century ago, the Middle East was culturally static. In March 1914, the National Geographic Magazine published an article by John D. Whiting on "Village Life in the Holy Land". And here is a colourised photo of a village carpenter which, apart from the clothing, might not have been out of place in First Century Nazareth. And yes, Jesus probably wore a turban.

How Gordon Died

      Of all late Victorian heroes, probably none has captured the imagination more than General Charles Gordon. It is little wonder: a lone Englishman, hundreds of miles from civilisation, valiantly attempting to hold the line against a horde of barbaric religious fanatics, only to be slain at the fall of Khartoum, just two days before the arrival of the force sent to relieve him. I first heard about him in the 1966 film, Khartoum. Who could forget the climax, where Gordon strode out to confront the dervish army in the governor's palace, only to be killed with a spear? But did it happen that way?

"Seadromes": an Idea Whose Time Never Came

       In 1844 Edgar Allan Poe produced a short story about a balloon crossing the Atlantic in three days. Fast forward a century, and we discover that balloons are out of fashion, but commercial transAtlantic flights by aircraft are still in their infancy. The first such flight, by Lufthansa, took place in 1938, and lasted 25 hours. You can immediately see a problem: compared to today, flights were much slower and, unlike balloons, required copious amounts of fuel. Also, there existed other, longer stretches of ocean. The first commercial transPacific flight may have been in 1935, but it involved a series of island hops. Nevertheless, a solution had been suggested for the problem: just as aerodromes were scattered all over the land, it might be possible to scatter the sea with marine aerodromes, or "seadromes" as they were called. Much later, the concept was used to produce floating oil rigs but, basically, it was an idea whose time never came. For your information, nevertheless, I shall introduce you to this forgotten topic by reprinting an essay from the same 1939 British boys' magazine as in my previous article.

The Remarkable Birth of Television

       At one point in The Living Shadow, the first novel in The Shadow series, the mysterious crime fighter communicates with his agents via television. The year was 1931, and television was ultra-high-tech - so high, in fact, that the author does not appear to have introduced it again. By the end of the 1930s a few countries had a few television stations in a few cities for a few customers, but introducing the technology involved a vast network of channels, performers, and customers, that it is no wonder that it did not take off until after the war. Television has been part of our lives for so long, that hardly anyone knows the remarkable series of events which led to its development. Fear not, I happened to discover an article on the subject in - believe it or not! - a British boys' magazine of 1939, which I am pleased to share with you. You may also care to note the predictions made by the author, and see how they turned out.

The Fabulous Londonderry Gold Bubble

       It is a little known fact that Scrooge McDuck arrived at the Kalgoorlie gold fields in the pouch of a kangaroo. It just goes to show that, although separated by half and century and half the world, the story of the great Western Australian gold rush of the 1890s had come to the attention of a well read cartoonist. Kalgoorie is still a major town, with a gigantic open cut mine, because it is no longer feasible for gold to be extracted except on a massive industrial scale. The site of the first discovery, Coolgardie is now a village living on tourism and its history. But 14 km from Coolgardie stands the ghost town of Londonderry. This was the site which, in 1894, brought wealth beyond the dreams of avarice to the original discoverers, and a huge financial "bubble" which brought disappointment and ruin to innumerable others in its wake.

A Leopard by the Tail

     Yes, it is possible to kill a leopard in single combat, but it is not something recommended. Five years ago I reported two cases: taxidermist and animal collector, Carl Akeley, who straggled one, and the one-handed giant, Jean-Pierre Hallet, who slew one Tarzan-style, but leaping on its back and stabbing it. So this time, I shall tell the story of Captain Edward Wood, formerly a forestry official in British India, who gave a whole new meaning to the expression "swing a cat".

Of Cricket Balls and Sparrows

      Considering the Brits' penchant for tradition and eccentricities, I'm not surprised that the stuffed cricket is still in the M.C.C. Museum at Lord's. For those who are unaware, Lord's Cricket Ground in St John's Wood, London is considered the home of cricket, although it is owned by the Marylebone Cricket Club or M.C.C. Which brings us to the events of 3 July 1936.

      It was a game between the M.C.C. and Cambridge University, with Jahangir Khan, a pre-independence Indian bowling for the University, and Tom Pearce batting for the M.C.C. Pearce hit the ball hard. It sailed through the air - and killed a sparrow in full flight. Apparently both the sparrow and the ball are now in the M.C.C. Museum.

     Something similar happened at Kennington Oval, the home of the Surrey Cricket Club. I presume this was before 1934, when Jack Hobbs retired as batsman. He was considered one of the greatest batsmen of all time but, unfortunately, on this occasion none of the other members of the team were up to scratch. Surrey needed three runs to win when Hobbs sent the ball on a long flight towards the boundary. Just then, a sparrow got in the way. It was killed, of course, but the ball was slowed down, and Hobbs was able to make only two runs. A game lost because of a luckless sparrow!

Reference: 'The funny side of cricket' by Jack Graydon, Chums Annual 1939, pp 138-9

Women of Tunisia, 1913

      Far be it from me to claim an intricate knowledge of the fine points of Islamic law. However, I understand that men are required to cover themselves from at least the navel to the knee, and women all except their hands and face. For women, I gather that the head scarf is obligatory, but the face veil optional, its use dependent on custom. In rural areas, where women need to work extensively outside the home, it is rarer than in the cities. You will find many websites contrasting the bare heads of educated Muslim women in the 1960s and '70s with their scarf-covered sisters of today. But what was it like a hundred or so years ago? Well, the whole of the January 1914 issue of the National Geographic was given over to an account of North Africa, especially Tunisia, by a Frank Edward Johnson, and although women were only part of the story, they did appear in many of the photographs. As far as I can tell, the photographers were male. In other words, it is not as if some female photographer gained access to naïve inhabitants of the harem. 

The Fireman Prince

      We know him as King Edward VII - Edward the Peacemaker - but for most of his life he was Bertie, Prince of Wales, the eldest son of Queen Victoria. And because she refused to ever provide him with royal duties, even to train him for his future role, he was left to follow the dissipated life of the idle rich. History tends to remember him for his mistresses, his parties, and his gambling, but there was another side of him hardly ever shown to the nation. To understand this, you must be aware that his London residence was Marlborough House in Pall Mall.

Hide! The Comet is Coming!

      Halley's Comet, as everyone knows, appears every 76 years - more or less. Its return in 1986 was a damp squib. We were all disappointed. But in 1910 its appearance had some interesting effects. Here is the brief account given by Frank Edward Johnson about what happened in Tripoli, in what is now Libya, on that occasion.

     Rain water is the only drinking water used and is kept in huge cisterns build under the houses. During the passage of the Halley comet the Jews of Tripoli were afraid of dying and took refuge in their great cisterns, which they had pumped dry for the purpose. Twenty-four hours having elapsed, they came out of their hiding places to find the world the same as before.

     The Arabs said that they were in the hands of Allah and refused to take refuge in their cisterns. So the few foreigners and the Arabs were the only ones who had any drinking water left, and the Arabs sold drinking water to the Jews until the next rains, about six months later.

     And if my experiences were anything to go on, the two groups would have lived in separate quarters of the city.

Reference: Frank Edward Johnson, 'Here and There in Northern Africa', The National Geographic Magazine, Jan. 1914, at pages 95-6

The Blind Girl Sees

"I see men; but they look like trees, walking." (Mk 8:24, RSV)

     Such were the words of a blind man in the process of regaining his sight. Those who have lost their sight, I presume, remember to some extent what the world used to look like. But what about those born blind? Initially, in fact, they would not even know they were blind.