Headline News 1871

Here are some news flashes from the Brooklyn Eagle on April 6, 1871 (p.1). They were collected as "Miscellaneous Items." These are the ones I liked the best. I learned a few odd useless facts too, which is always enjoyable:

The orange crop at Los Angelos [sic] is a success.

Von Moltke, minus potato

Von Moltke [chief of staff of the Prussian Army] has had a new variety of potato named after him [see Culinary Note below]*

New York City daily spends $8500 for bread, and $10,000 for cigars.


The name of a revenue collector in the Eighth Ohio District is Robb.

It costs more for eggs than for flour in first-class hotels.

The New York City Hall Park has been provided with fixed iron chairs.

City Hall Park ca 1900

William Cullen Bryant, before coffee.

The venerable poet editor Bryant  [William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878) poet, journalist and editor of the New York Evening Post] gets up at 6 o'clock, takes a bath, and eats a light breakfast.

The number of horses imported into New Hampshire from Canada was never so large as at the present time.

Martin Tupper, in a pensive pose

A Cincinnatian who rashly asked for Martin F. Tupper's autograph, received by return post an autograph letter and four photographs of the proverbial philosopher, taken in different positions. [Tupper, (1810-1889), was an English writer and poet of great effusiveness; at Picture History it is noted that "his vanity...was so much a part of everything he wrote."]

Culinary Note: I didn't find out what sort of potato was named after Von Moltke, but here is a recipe from Dressed Vegetables à la Mode by Harriet Anne De Salis (London 1888, p. 52):

Potatoes à la Moltke

Take about eight good-sized potatoes, peel and cut them into long thin slices. Have ready three tablespoons of butter mixed with two tablespoonfuls of flour and put them in a stewpan and stir over the fire till the butter is a good brown colour; then add half a pint of broth and two tablespoonfuls of vinegar. Put the potatoes in this gravy and let them simmer gently till tender, which will be in twelve to fifteen minutes. Serve very hot. Some cooks put in a bay-leaf to simmer with the potatoes.

The pictures of Von Moltke and Bryant are from Wikipedia (links above); the California oranges from NYPL Digital Gallery; and Martin Tupper is from Picture History. City Hall Park postcard (circa 1900) from NYPL Digital Gallery.