PYF Historical Fun Fact: (USER LOSETH POSTYNG PRIVILYGES FOR FOUR AND TWENTY HOURS)

The Something Awful Forums > Main > Post Your Favorite: Carefully Curated > PYF Historical Fun Fact: (USER LOSETH POSTYNG PRIVILYGES FOR FOUR AND TWENTY HOURS)

«‹›382 »

Platystemon: Feb 13, 2012; BREADS

hawowanlawow posted:

I bet the "garrote executioner" position had a lot of burnout

The boss strings them along for a while, but eventually they all drop a line and give their two weeks notice.

# ? Sep 21, 2017 21:47

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# ? May 15, 2024 05:16

System Metternich: Feb 28, 2010; But what did he mean by that?

Have two interesting facts from the personal history of GDR leaders I learned today:

:eng101:

It's a well-known fact that the later years of the Weimar Republic were marked by a brutal conflict between the Communist KPD and the Nazi NSDAP. Despites all their hatred against each other both parties shared a common enemy though, which they hated even more: democracy itself! Thus it was fully possible that at some points the KPD and the NSDAP would cooperate, when their respective interests would overlap.

One such occasion was the 1932 Berlin transport strike, when the union-level organisations of both KPD and NSDAP would form a united alliance against the social democratic SPD. The photo above was taken at a rally held during the strike: it shows Walter Ulbricht (born 1893), a high-ranking KPD member and MP, delivering a speech, while to the left of him a certain Joseph Goebbels (born 1897) listens attentively (?), his head resting on his hand (Edit: actually it was probably taken at a different event, see below). At the time Goebbels, one of Hitler's closest confidants, was leader of the NSDAP in Berlin and also responsible for the entire propaganda department of the party; he would go on to become German propaganda minister and one of the most powerful people of the Third Reich until his eventual suicide in 1945. After Hitler's appointment to chancellor in 1933, Ulbricht on the other hand fled first to Paris and then to Moscow in 1938. After the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, Ulbricht became Stalin's chief executive for Soviet propaganda aimed at Germans. After the war had ended, Stalin installed Ulbricht as the most powerful man of the emerging GDR. Ulbricht would rule the country with an iron fist, his most infamous achievement being the erection of the inner-German border wall in 1961. He got deposed ten years later when Erich Honecker, a young(er) and power-hungry member of the central party committee secured himself the backing of Moscow and forced Ulbricht at gunpoint to abdicate. Ulbricht died in 1973, isolated and embittered.

About a year before the joint KPD-NSDAP rally described above, Ulbricht and a number of other KPD members got themselves involved in a much bloodier affair. After a 19yo KPD member named Fritz Auge had been shot dead by a police officer during a demonstration in Berlin that had gone bad, Ulbricht, who had for a long time urged his comrades to to not just defend against, but specifically target police officers ("At home in Saxony we would have done something about the police a long time ago. Here in Berlin we will not fool around much longer. Soon we will hit the police in the head."), encouraged fellow KPD members to take revenge. Only hours after Auge's death, the above graffitto appeared on a wall near to where he had died; it read "For every killed worker there will be two dead police officers!!! The Red Front [=the paramilitary wing of the KPD that had been banned in 1929 but lived on under a number of differenct successor organisations] takes revenge. The Red Front lives on." The "Schupo" mentioned in the German text was the "Schutzpolizei", i.e. the part of the police that was present "on the ground" and therefore the most involved when KPD rallies turned violent. The KPD conspirators decided to target Captain Paul Anlauf specifically; his beat included the KPD headquarters, and he was probably the individual police officer hated the most by the Berlin KPD. Two communist volunteers, Erich Mielke (born 1907) and Erich Ziemer (born 1906), shot and killed Anlauf together with another officer the day after Auge's death. In the following confusion, other police officers started firing wildly at the crowd; at the end of a bloody shootout, the scene numbered four dead and 35 injured. Mielke and Ziemer however were able to escape.

A 1933 poster depicting those who were suspected to directly or indirectly have been involved with the murder

Mielke and Ziemer fled to Moscow, where they were trained by the NKVD in paramilitary tactics and espionage. Both were sent to Spain in order to support the Republican struggle against the fascist takeover. Ziemer was KIA there in 1937, while Mielke went on to become one of the Soviets' most important men on site to spy on Republican commandos and purge anti-Stalinist elements amongst them. After the war, Mielke immediately became an important part of the Soviet takeover of East Germany. In 1957, he became the director of the GDR's intelligence agency, the dreaded and all-powerful Stasi. Mielke led the agency until his forced removal in 1989. His past as a murderer didn't leave him, however: in 1993, more than 60 years after the crime, he was sentenced to six years in prison for the murder of Paul Anlauf and his fellow officer. Due to his old age and because he had already spent most of the six years in prison, Mielke was released in 1995 and died five years later in Berlin.

e: it looks like the first photo actually shows a different occasion where Ulbricht and Goebbels met, though in this case not as part of a joint rally but instead as political opponents publicly debating politics! Sorry for any confusion; I'll leave the image here though unless I manage to find a photo actually depicting the event in question.

System Metternich has a new favorite as of 23:56 on Sep 21, 2017

# ? Sep 21, 2017 23:26

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

plainswalker75 posted:

Yeah, it's a real pain in the neck to find replacements though.

Puns like this always end up strangling discussion.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 04:05

Samovar: Jun 4, 2011; I'm 😤 not a 🦸🏻‍♂️hero...🧜🏻

PMush Perfect posted:

Puns like this always end up strangling discussion.

I prefer my discourses going full-throttle.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 04:14

Beachcomber: May 21, 2007; Another day in paradise.; Slippery Tilde

Samovar posted:

I prefer my discourses going full-throttle.

Breathtaking.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 04:35

hard counter: Jan 2, 2015

plainswalker75 posted:

Yeah, it's a real pain in the neck to find replacements though.

yeah it's hard to find other candidates with air-tight credentials

# ? Sep 22, 2017 04:37

Sweevo: Nov 8, 2007; i sometimes throw cables away

i mean straight into the bin without spending 10+ years in the box of might-come-in-handy-someday first

im a fucking monster

hard counter posted:

yeah it's hard to find other candidates with air-tight credentials

anyone could get the job if they pulled a few strings

# ? Sep 22, 2017 10:40

Admiral Joeslop: Jul 8, 2010

Sweevo posted:

anyone could get the job if they pulled a few strings

Only if they choke out.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 13:17

Alhazred: Feb 16, 2011

In 1627 Germany had burned so many "witches" that they started to run out of wood, two villages south of Cologne even refused to provide wood for the witch burnings because they needed it to get through the winter.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 16:50

TenCentFang: Sep 5, 2017; by Nyc_Tattoo

Well you can't say they didn't learn any lessons for the next time they needed to kill mass amounts of innocent people.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 17:26

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

TenCentFang posted:

Well you can't say they didn't learn any lessons for the next time they needed to kill mass amounts of innocent people.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 20:10

Solice Kirsk: Jun 1, 2004; .

TenCentFang posted:

Well you can't say they didn't learn any lessons for the next time they needed to kill mass amounts of innocent people.

# ? Sep 22, 2017 20:25

Acebuckeye13: Nov 2, 2010; Ultra Carp

System Metternich posted:

Have two interesting facts from the personal history of GDR leaders I learned today:

It's a well-known fact that the later years of the Weimar Republic were marked by a brutal conflict between the Communist KPD and the Nazi NSDAP. Despites all their hatred against each other both parties shared a common enemy though, which they hated even more: democracy itself! Thus it was fully possible that at some points the KPD and the NSDAP would cooperate, when their respective interests would overlap.

One such occasion was the 1932 Berlin transport strike, when the union-level organisations of both KPD and NSDAP would form a united alliance against the social democratic SPD. The photo above was taken at a rally held during the strike: it shows Walter Ulbricht (born 1893), a high-ranking KPD member and MP, delivering a speech, while to the left of him a certain Joseph Goebbels (born 1897) listens attentively (?), his head resting on his hand (Edit: actually it was probably taken at a different event, see below). At the time Goebbels, one of Hitler's closest confidants, was leader of the NSDAP in Berlin and also responsible for the entire propaganda department of the party; he would go on to become German propaganda minister and one of the most powerful people of the Third Reich until his eventual suicide in 1945. After Hitler's appointment to chancellor in 1933, Ulbricht on the other hand fled first to Paris and then to Moscow in 1938. After the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, Ulbricht became Stalin's chief executive for Soviet propaganda aimed at Germans. After the war had ended, Stalin installed Ulbricht as the most powerful man of the emerging GDR. Ulbricht would rule the country with an iron fist, his most infamous achievement being the erection of the inner-German border wall in 1961. He got deposed ten years later when Erich Honecker, a young(er) and power-hungry member of the central party committee secured himself the backing of Moscow and forced Ulbricht at gunpoint to abdicate. Ulbricht died in 1973, isolated and embittered.

About a year before the joint KPD-NSDAP rally described above, Ulbricht and a number of other KPD members got themselves involved in a much bloodier affair. After a 19yo KPD member named Fritz Auge had been shot dead by a police officer during a demonstration in Berlin that had gone bad, Ulbricht, who had for a long time urged his comrades to to not just defend against, but specifically target police officers ("At home in Saxony we would have done something about the police a long time ago. Here in Berlin we will not fool around much longer. Soon we will hit the police in the head."), encouraged fellow KPD members to take revenge. Only hours after Auge's death, the above graffitto appeared on a wall near to where he had died; it read "For every killed worker there will be two dead police officers!!! The Red Front [=the paramilitary wing of the KPD that had been banned in 1929 but lived on under a number of differenct successor organisations] takes revenge. The Red Front lives on." The "Schupo" mentioned in the German text was the "Schutzpolizei", i.e. the part of the police that was present "on the ground" and therefore the most involved when KPD rallies turned violent. The KPD conspirators decided to target Captain Paul Anlauf specifically; his beat included the KPD headquarters, and he was probably the individual police officer hated the most by the Berlin KPD. Two communist volunteers, Erich Mielke (born 1907) and Erich Ziemer (born 1906), shot and killed Anlauf together with another officer the day after Auge's death. In the following confusion, other police officers started firing wildly at the crowd; at the end of a bloody shootout, the scene numbered four dead and 35 injured. Mielke and Ziemer however were able to escape.

A 1933 poster depicting those who were suspected to directly or indirectly have been involved with the murder

Mielke and Ziemer fled to Moscow, where they were trained by the NKVD in paramilitary tactics and espionage. Both were sent to Spain in order to support the Republican struggle against the fascist takeover. Ziemer was KIA there in 1937, while Mielke went on to become one of the Soviets' most important men on site to spy on Republican commandos and purge anti-Stalinist elements amongst them. After the war, Mielke immediately became an important part of the Soviet takeover of East Germany. In 1957, he became the director of the GDR's intelligence agency, the dreaded and all-powerful Stasi. Mielke led the agency until his forced removal in 1989. His past as a murderer didn't leave him, however: in 1993, more than 60 years after the crime, he was sentenced to six years in prison for the murder of Paul Anlauf and his fellow officer. Due to his old age and because he had already spent most of the six years in prison, Mielke was released in 1995 and died five years later in Berlin.

e: it looks like the first photo actually shows a different occasion where Ulbricht and Goebbels met, though in this case not as part of a joint rally but instead as political opponents publicly debating politics! Sorry for any confusion; I'll leave the image here though unless I manage to find a photo actually depicting the event in question.

This got passed over for punchat but this was a Good Post

# ? Sep 22, 2017 21:10

Chichevache: Feb 17, 2010; One of the funniest posters in GIP.

Just not intentionally.

TenCentFang posted:

Well you can't say they didn't learn any lessons for the next time they needed to kill mass amounts of innocent people.

Innocent? I thought they convicted them beforehand. The witches, I mean.

# ? Sep 23, 2017 06:10

Alhazred: Feb 16, 2011

TenCentFang posted:

Well you can't say they didn't learn any lessons for the next time they needed to kill mass amounts of innocent people.

They actually solved the firewood shortage problem by building huts which they put all the "witches" they could find into and then set the huts on fire.

# ? Sep 23, 2017 09:32

TenCentFang: Sep 5, 2017; by Nyc_Tattoo

Alhazred posted:

They actually solved the firewood shortage problem by building huts which they put all the "witches" they could find into and then set the huts on fire.

Ironically, the person who came up with that innovation was Jewish. First they came for the witches...

# ? Sep 23, 2017 09:36

Agents are GO!: Dec 29, 2004

Platystemon posted:

He should have commuted it only on the condition that they climb Kilimanjaro.

Both peaks.

# ? Sep 23, 2017 13:48

Ranestone: Sep 19, 2017

Carbon dioxide posted:

That, also some Norse god, and also the actual Turkish saint St Nicholas features somewhere.

E: Also, Santa got his modern colors from Coca Cola.

Some Turkish archaologists think they found the tomb of Santa Claus/St. Nicholas recently:

"The crypt of St. Nicholas, popularly known as Santa Claus, was found in the famed saint’s namesake church in the Demre district of Antalya, a southern region of Turkey believed to be his birthplace. The tomb was revealed during a digital analysis of the ground beneath the 5th century Byzantine church." - http://www.history.com/news/archaeologists-might-have-found-the-tomb-of-santa-claus

The tomb itself is being protected by mosaic on the floor of the church, so archaologists are still trying to figure out how to dig/break into it.

# ? Oct 12, 2017 07:38

Phy: Jun 27, 2008; Fun Shoe

Ranestone posted:

Some Turkish archaologists think they found the tomb of Santa Claus/St. Nicholas recently:

"The crypt of St. Nicholas, popularly known as Santa Claus, was found in the famed saint’s namesake church in the Demre district of Antalya, a southern region of Turkey believed to be his birthplace. The tomb was revealed during a digital analysis of the ground beneath the 5th century Byzantine church." - http://www.history.com/news/archaeologists-might-have-found-the-tomb-of-santa-claus

The tomb itself is being protected by mosaic on the floor of the church, so archaologists are still trying to figure out how to dig/break into it.

The idea of maybe possibly not digging up St Nicholas was rejected out of hand. "What do you think is going to happen," one researcher was overheard to say. "What, like his revenant is going to stride the earth in some kind of grisly Santapocalypse? Superstitious nonsense."

# ? Oct 12, 2017 18:37

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

I mean, it's almost Halloween. If there was ever a time...

# ? Oct 12, 2017 20:10

AriadneThread: Feb 17, 2011; The Devil sounds like smoke and honey. We cannot move. It is too beautiful.

for hundreds of years santa has given out presents...
but tonight...
he's come back...
to collect!

# ? Oct 12, 2017 21:19

Mr.Tophat: Apr 7, 2007; You clearly don't understand joke development

AriadneThread posted:

for hundreds of years santa has given out presents...
but tonight...
he's come back...
to collect!

The only way to slay Santa is for all the naughty children to use their coal to incinerate him

# ? Oct 12, 2017 23:37

Government Handjob: Nov 1, 2004; Gudbrandsglasnost; College Slice

Other gods play
Santa Claus slays

# ? Oct 13, 2017 10:40

Remulak: Jun 8, 2001; I can't count to four.; Yams Fan

Fun fact: in the Neolithic there were no wedding rings:

# ? Oct 13, 2017 11:01

C.M. Kruger: Oct 28, 2013

# ? Oct 14, 2017 06:57

Automatic Retard: Oct 21, 2010; PUT THIS WANKSTAIN ON IGNORE

Goode tymes, Goode tymes.

# ? Oct 14, 2017 08:19

Free Market Mambo: Jul 26, 2010; by Lowtax

Boyes shall be boyes

# ? Oct 14, 2017 08:45

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

Fratte partee!

# ? Oct 14, 2017 09:01

Kassad: Nov 12, 2005; It's about time.

So that's where the Bullingdon Club comes from.

# ? Oct 14, 2017 09:16

Coucho Marx: Mar 2, 2009; kick back and relax

loving nothing new under the sun, is there?

# ? Oct 14, 2017 09:26

Les Os: Mar 29, 2010

life is hard for hostesses

# ? Oct 14, 2017 09:53

Nth Doctor: Sep 7, 2010; Darkrai used Dream Eater!
It's super effective!

Myne bretherein, toniyte shall we engagyg upon the endeavorre of a hyste of undergarments of the fair maidennes of delta gamma. Yn faythe there shall be songes of toniyte.

# ? Oct 15, 2017 01:12

MAKE NO BABBYS: Jan 28, 2010

PMush Perfect posted:

I swear, we'd have cured cancer by now if it was an obstacle between a platoon of marines and getting shitfaced.

As a person who has spent the last ten years studying spirits and distillation and teaching others about them, I can tell you that this is universally true across history and human (and in some cases, animal) kind. The sheer volume of effort, discovery, ingenuity and science that has gone into figuring out ways to get hosed up is amazing.

# ? Oct 15, 2017 10:14

Khazar-khum: Oct 22, 2008; Cat Army
2nd Battalion

MAKE NO BABBYS posted:

As a person who has spent the last ten years studying spirits and distillation and teaching others about them, I can tell you that this is universally true across history and human (and in some cases, animal) kind. The sheer volume of effort, discovery, ingenuity and science that has gone into figuring out ways to get hosed up is amazing.

That and girls. If you had to go to space to impress girls and get slammed, we'd have colonies on Pluto by now.

# ? Oct 15, 2017 10:42

InediblePenguin: Sep 27, 2004; I'm strong. And a giant penguin. Please don't eat me. No, really. Don't try.

Befaithful Asser

# ? Oct 16, 2017 20:31

System Metternich: Feb 28, 2010; But what did he mean by that?

Ah, the joys of a simple Georgian/early Victorian English kitchen: Good conversations, good ale, the children are playing, the fire is roaring in the chimney and a small dog is running in a large wheel affixed to the wall. Wait, what?

Meet the “turnspit dog“ (canis vertigus or “dizzy dog“) or “vernepator cur“, a now extinct breed of dogs that nevertheless was a staple of large English kitchens throughout the early modern era. You've probably all seen or read the cliche image of a medieval scullion slowly turning a large piece of meat over an open fire as to prepare it for the feast. Well, this was dull and repetitive work and probably not very popular with whoever had to do it, so the 16th century (the dogs were first mentioned in 1576 as “turnespetes“, but they may well have been employed first at an even earlier date) saw an innovation that would revolutionise the kitchen: a dog, running in a wheel and thereby turning the meat - well, not automatically, but close enough. The wheels were put far away from the fire as for the dogs not to overheat, and they would also work in shifts - turning spits all day was exhausting, and so most every kitchen would keep at least two turnspits to relieve each other. Extant sources of the time even tell us that the dogs would know when their time was up and would leave their wheel as if on cue for the other one to take over. They also doubled as foot warmers, and there's the nice anecdote of the Bishop of Gloucester once giving a sermon in Bath and saying "It was then that Ezekiel saw the wheel...", when a couple of foot-warming turnspits among the audience would hear the last word and immediately run for the door, although I cannot say whether they wanted to jump into the wheel right away or tried to get the gently caress out of Dodge instead.

The usage of turnspit dogs wasn't limited to the UK, though; we know of several large kitchens in the US where they were employed as well. Benjamin Franklin's Philadelphia Gazette had advertisements for both dogs and wheels, and their bad treatment by NYC hotel owners in the 19th century was one of the main reasons for the formation of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

The advent of automated roast spit turners, so-called “clock jacks“ or “roasting jacks“ in the 19th century would eventually lead to the breed's disappearance. By 1750 they were ubiquitous, by 1850 only poor people still had them and by 1900 they were effectively extinct, although Queen Victoria would adopt unemployed turnspits as pets.

The short-legged breed died out that quickly because most people saw them as nothing more than tools, and many sources take note of how ugly they were and that they tended to have a “morose disposition“ as well. You can be the judge of that - above you can see “Whiskey“, the only taxidermied example of a turnspit dog in existence, displayed at the Abergavenny Museum in Wales. It's not the best example of taxidermy, either. Personally I think it looks cute.

I'm no expert in dogs, so I'll have to rely on the experts who tell me that the turnspit was either a kind of Glen of Imaal Terrier or Welsh Corgi, so it may well be that the closest living relatives of the lowly wheel-running dog now are the Queen's favourite pet.

System Metternich has a new favorite as of 22:26 on Oct 17, 2017

# ? Oct 17, 2017 22:22

chitoryu12: Apr 24, 2014

System Metternich posted:

Ah, the joys of a simple Georgian/early Victorian English kitchen: Good conversations, good ale, the children are playing, the fire is roaring in the chimney and a small dog is running in a large wheel affixed to the wall. Wait, what?

Meet the “turnspit dog“ (canis vertigus or “dizzy dog“) or “vernepator cur“, a now extinct breed of dogs that nevertheless was a staple of large English kitchens throughout the early modern era. You've probably all seen or read the cliche image of a medieval scullion slowly turning a large piece of meat over an open fire as to prepare it for the feast. Well, this was dull and repetitive work and probably not very popular with whoever had to do it, so the 16th century (the dogs were first mentioned in 1576 as “turnespetes“, but they may well have been employed first at an even earlier date) saw an innovation that would revolutionise the kitchen: a dog, running in a wheel and thereby turning the meat - well, not automatically, but close enough. The wheels were put far away from the fire as for the dogs not to overheat, and they would also work in shifts - turning spits all day was exhausting, and so most every kitchen would keep at least two turnspits to relieve each other. Extant sources of the time even tell us that the dogs would know when their time was up and would leave their wheel as if on cue for the other one to take over. They also doubled as foot warmers, and there's the nice anecdote of the Bishop of Gloucester once giving a sermon in Bath and saying "It was then that Ezekiel saw the wheel...", when a couple of foot-warming turnspits among the audience would hear the last word and immediately run for the door, although I cannot say whether they wanted to jump into the wheel right away or tried to get the gently caress out of Dodge instead.

The usage of turnspit dogs wasn't limited to the UK, though; we know of several large kitchens in the US where they were employed as well. Benjamin Franklin's Philadelphia Gazette had advertisements for both dogs and wheels, and their bad treatment by NYC hotel owners in the 19th century was one of the main reasons for the formation of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

The advent of automated roast spit turners, so-called “clock jacks“ or “roasting jacks“ in the 19th century would eventually lead to the breed's disappearance. By 1750 they were ubiquitous, by 1850 only poor people still had them and by 1900 they were effectively extinct, although Queen Victoria would adopt unemployed turnspits as pets.

The short-legged breed died out that quickly because most people saw them as nothing more than tools, and many sources take note of how ugly they were and that they tended to have a “morose disposition“ as well. You can be the judge of that - above you can see “Whiskey“, the only taxidermied example of a turnspit dog in existence, displayed at the Abergavenny Museum in Wales. It's not the best example of taxidermy, either. Personally I think it looks cute.

I'm no expert in dogs, so I'll have to rely on the experts who tell me that the turnspit was either a kind of Glen of Imaal Terrier or Welsh Corgi, so it may well be that the closest living relatives of the lowly wheel-running dog now are the Queen's favourite pet.

I spent this entire drat post thinking it was an elaborate joke.

My God.

# ? Oct 17, 2017 22:33

Deteriorata: Feb 6, 2005

Related, Dog Power at The Museum of Retro Technology

ca. 1875:

1939:

1908:

# ? Oct 17, 2017 22:39

Carbon dioxide: Oct 9, 2012

System Metternich posted:

Ah, the joys of a simple Georgian/early Victorian English kitchen: Good conversations, good ale, the children are playing, the fire is roaring in the chimney and a small dog is running in a large wheel affixed to the wall. Wait, what?

Meet the “turnspit dog“ (canis vertigus or “dizzy dog“) or “vernepator cur“, a now extinct breed of dogs that nevertheless was a staple of large English kitchens throughout the early modern era. You've probably all seen or read the cliche image of a medieval scullion slowly turning a large piece of meat over an open fire as to prepare it for the feast. Well, this was dull and repetitive work and probably not very popular with whoever had to do it, so the 16th century (the dogs were first mentioned in 1576 as “turnespetes“, but they may well have been employed first at an even earlier date) saw an innovation that would revolutionise the kitchen: a dog, running in a wheel and thereby turning the meat - well, not automatically, but close enough. The wheels were put far away from the fire as for the dogs not to overheat, and they would also work in shifts - turning spits all day was exhausting, and so most every kitchen would keep at least two turnspits to relieve each other. Extant sources of the time even tell us that the dogs would know when their time was up and would leave their wheel as if on cue for the other one to take over. They also doubled as foot warmers, and there's the nice anecdote of the Bishop of Gloucester once giving a sermon in Bath and saying "It was then that Ezekiel saw the wheel...", when a couple of foot-warming turnspits among the audience would hear the last word and immediately run for the door, although I cannot say whether they wanted to jump into the wheel right away or tried to get the gently caress out of Dodge instead.

The usage of turnspit dogs wasn't limited to the UK, though; we know of several large kitchens in the US where they were employed as well. Benjamin Franklin's Philadelphia Gazette had advertisements for both dogs and wheels, and their bad treatment by NYC hotel owners in the 19th century was one of the main reasons for the formation of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

The advent of automated roast spit turners, so-called “clock jacks“ or “roasting jacks“ in the 19th century would eventually lead to the breed's disappearance. By 1750 they were ubiquitous, by 1850 only poor people still had them and by 1900 they were effectively extinct, although Queen Victoria would adopt unemployed turnspits as pets.

The short-legged breed died out that quickly because most people saw them as nothing more than tools, and many sources take note of how ugly they were and that they tended to have a “morose disposition“ as well. You can be the judge of that - above you can see “Whiskey“, the only taxidermied example of a turnspit dog in existence, displayed at the Abergavenny Museum in Wales. It's not the best example of taxidermy, either. Personally I think it looks cute.

I'm no expert in dogs, so I'll have to rely on the experts who tell me that the turnspit was either a kind of Glen of Imaal Terrier or Welsh Corgi, so it may well be that the closest living relatives of the lowly wheel-running dog now are the Queen's favourite pet.

If Wikipedia is to be trusted, this type of dog was also known as the "Underdog".

# ? Oct 17, 2017 23:06

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 15, 2024 05:16

Platystemon: Feb 13, 2012; BREADS

Carbon dioxide posted:

If Wikipedia is to be trusted, this type of dog was also known as the "Underdog".

If Wikipedia is to be trusted, that term comes from the timber industry.

# ? Oct 17, 2017 23:44

The Something Awful Forums > Main > Post Your Favorite: Carefully Curated > PYF Historical Fun Fact: (USER LOSETH POSTYNG PRIVILYGES FOR FOUR AND TWENTY HOURS)

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