I’m sitting here at 04.20, wondering what I can tell you that you don’t already know, and suddenly, another thought pops into my head. No, it’s not What am I doing up at 04.21? I have been up since 03.30, mainly because I was asleep by half eight last night. The thought was, I wonder what was in the news on this day in 1894? There was an additional question too, ‘Was Greece mentioned?’
Why I should go down this route is mildly understandable, because I am setting my current ‘must read’ in that year, and I live in Greece. I am also fascinated by newspapers and other publications of that time, and have a subscription to the British Newspaper Archive. This means I can pop in and out when I want, and look up details of that day to match the, for example, weather on the same day in my imaginary world, to make the stories as realistic as possible. I also use it for finding names of products on sale at the time, prices, local as well as national events, and stories that might spark stories. Then there’s the historical background too, and while searching for the keyword ‘Greece’ in April 1894, I found a couple of interesting comparisons to today.
There was much about shipping, of course, but on April 9th, 1894, the Glasgow Herald was talking about the financial conditions of European countries, and when talking about a financial ‘manoeuvre’ stated that: … every repetition of the manoeuvre will bring Russia nearer to the abyss of national insolvency, on the very edge of which Italy, Spain and Portugal are already tottering, while Greece has practically made the final descent.
Ah well, as long as it still looks like this:
Greece is, as far as I know, back in the relative black of solvency these days, but there are still relevant headlines and stories. (Though I don’t think they were called headlines back then.) Monday 9th of April was a slow story day for the country of Greece, but there was a fascinating piece in the Morning Post about The Daffodil. This entertaining piece talked about a Mr Barr and the 500 varieties of daffodils he grows, and those he has found in southern Europe on his travels. [He] is just now engaged on a tour which includes Greece… verifying previous observations and searching for novelties. I am sure he found many, but not all of the flowering variety.
After that gratuitous but rather lovely shot from up in the village, here’s another story from later in the month. This snippet comes from the London Evening Standard on April 14th of the same year: Athens, Friday night. A member of the boulé has been committed to take his trial on a charge of complicity with brigands in Thessaly. The Government has given orders for a fresh election in his constituency.
No change there, then.
[I am told by an autobot that ‘The Boule, a basic institution of the ancient city-state in historical times, consisted of the citizens’ representatives who assembled in order to confer and decide about public affairs.’ According to another autobot, though, ‘The Boule wasn’t in existence in 1894’, which goes to show just how cautious one must be when using online transformers to find information. Cybertron doesn’t produce them like it used to.]
So, there you have it. What you have, I have no idea, but I do have a plan to battle on with chapter four (currently set in February 1894), and before I do that, and while I am in the archive, I shall have another quick browse of the papers to set myself in the scene, and leave you with ne last scene from Neil’s camera.
