THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
“NARRATIVE HISTORY” AMOUNTS TO FABULATION, THE REAL STUFF BEING MERE CHRONOLOGY
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Theodore Sedgwick Fay HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1799
December 22, Sunday evening: On Manhattan Island, 21-year-old Gulielma “Elma” Sands was seen for the last time.
December 24, Tuesday: Some of the belongings of the missing Gulielma “Elma” Sands were discovered in Lispenard Meadows (this locale on Manhattan Island is today in the SoHo district, near the intersection of Greene and Spring Streets).
(This is going to turn into a murder trial mystery, that would be being read about by Henry Thoreau during his college years.)
DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION? GOOD.
Theodore Sedgwick Fay “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1800
January 2, Thursday: The gruesome remains of Gulielma “Elma” Sands were recovered from a new Manhattan Well in the Lispenard Meadows district of Manhattan Island. She had been beaten before being dumped.
LIFE IS LIVED FORWARD BUT UNDERSTOOD BACKWARD? — NO, THAT’S GIVING TOO MUCH TO THE HISTORIAN’S STORIES. LIFE ISN’T TO BE UNDERSTOOD EITHER FORWARD OR BACKWARD.
March 31, Monday: The Northwest Territory Ordinance passed in the federal House of Representatives.
Johann Friedrich Reichardt’s liederspiel Lieb’ und Treue to his own words was performed for the initial time, in the Nationaltheater, Berlin.
In a New-York courtroom, a high-powered team of attorneys showed up to defend a 24-year-old carpenter accused of murder. Levi Weeks had well-to-do relatives who were going to stand up for him, and not allow him to be herded by newspaper publicity onto the hanging platform! The Dream Team to defend this client, who was being prosecuted by District Attorney Cadwallader David Colden in The People v. Levi Weeks on the charge of having thrown his supposed fiancee Gulielma “Elma” Sands down a well, was made up of Henry Brockholst Livingston, Aaron Burr, and Alexander Hamilton (Chief Justice John Lansing, Jr. would serve as the trial judge).
Later on this would be written about by Theodore Sedgwick Fay –whose father Joseph Dewey Fay (1779- 1825) had read for the law at Hamilton’s office– and what Fay had written would be read by Henry Thoreau while he was in college.
April 1, Tuesday: The Manhattan trial jury needed but five minutes of deliberation to find the young carpenter Levi Weeks not guilty of having been the murderer of Gulielma “Elma” Sands. There really had been no evidence whatever against him (other than that he had been residing in the same boardinghouse as this young lady — and that someone had recollected that on the day in question, he had gotten a goofy look on his face)! The general public would however be so enraged –having seen the accused tried and convicted in the press– that the court recorder for this case would be able to make a bunch of money by publishing the legal transcript he had been paid by the Court of Oyer and Terminer to produce: REPORT OF THE TRIAL OF LEVI WEEKS ON AN INDICTMENT FOR THE MURDER OF GULIELMA SANDS, ON MONDAY THE THIRTY-FIRST DAY OF MARCH, AND TUESDAY THE FIRST DAY OF APRIL, 1800 (New York: John Furman, 1800).
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Theodore Sedgwick Fay HDT WHAT? INDEX
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THE FUTURE IS MOST READILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Theodore Sedgwick Fay HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1807
February 10, Tuesday: The US Congress authorized a survey of the nation’s coasts and harbors: “An Act to Provide for Surveying the Coasts of the United States.” READ THE FULL TEXT
Theodore Sedgwick Fay was born in New-York, a son of the attorney Joseph Dewey Fay (1779-1825). Like his father, who had studied law in the office of Alexander Hamilton, would study for the law, although he would never practice, going instead into the field of diplomacy.
Friend Stephen Wanton Gould wrote in his journal: 3 day 10 of 2 M / Our friend Asa Russel of New Bedford called at the shop this afternoon, with whom I had much conversation on a subject which has deeply affected the minds of many & caused the Land to mourn for the wound which Zion has felt from the fall of a late dignified Servant Asa spoke feelingly on the subject & hoped it might be a warning to those who think they stand to take heed lest they fall. ——————————————————————————————————— RELIGIOUS SOCIETY OF FRIENDS
NOBODY COULD GUESS WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT
Theodore Sedgwick Fay “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1828
Theodore Sedgwick Fay was hired as an associate editor at The New York Mirror, A Weekly Journal, Devoted to Literature and the Fine Arts, where he would work with George Pope Morris and Nathaniel Parker Willis. Soon he would depart for Europe, and send back to the gazette a series of letters for publication.
THE FUTURE CAN BE EASILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Theodore Sedgwick Fay HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1832
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s DREAMS AND REVERIES OF A QUIET MAN: CONSISTING OF THE LITTLE GENIUS, AND OTHER ESSAYS (two volumes written in collaboration with his cousin Joseph Dewey Fay, consisting of a collection of articles previously published in the New-York literary gazette The New-York Mirror, A Weekly Journal, Devoted to Literature and the Fine Arts, including a series on high society). THE GAZETTE’S 7TH YEAR THE GAZETTE’S 8TH YEAR
The 1st student was admitted to the University of the City of New-York, located on Washington Square.
CHANGE IS ETERNITY, STASIS A FIGMENT
Theodore Sedgwick Fay “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1833
1 Theodore Sedgwick Fay “edited” two volumes of CRAYON SKETCHES. BY AN AMATEUR. He got married (to someone whose name is not mentioned anywhere that I can find). He sailed for Europe (presumably accompanied by his bride, although the record makes no mention of this). The first product of this adventure would be THE MINUTE BOOK, A RECORD OF TRAVEL. Said travel would continue for three years.
The Handsome Bridegroom
1. The amateur in question supposedly had been named “William Cox” and supposedly had been a visiting Englishman, and these essays had originally been presented in the The New York Mirror, A Weekly Journal, Devoted to Literature and the Fine Arts under the initial “C.” However, I have no date of birth or date of demise, and doubt that this was anything more than a pseudonym. THE GAZETTE’S 10TH YEAR HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1834
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s “The Author,” “An Outline Sketch,” “Snorers,” and “The Little Hard-Faced Old Gentleman” got included in the two volumes of THE ATLANTIC CLUB-BOOK: BEING SKETCHES IN PROSE AND VERSE, BY MESSRS. PAULDING, HALLECK, COX, BRYANT, LEGGETT, MARTIN, SIMMS, STUART, WILLIS, PALMER, WOODWORTH, POWER, HACKETT, SANFORD, BIRD, MRS. LEARNED, MRS. SIGOURNEY, MRS. EMBURY, MISS KEMBLE, AND OTHER AUTHORS. HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1835
November: Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s 1st novel, NORMAN LESLIE: A TALE OF THE PRESENT TIMES (Harper and Brothers, two volumes), was based on a murder that had occurred on Manhattan Island in New-York at the beginning of the century, the “Lispenard Meadow Well Mystery,” that had won enduring fame because District Attorney Cadwallader David Colden had been the prosecutor while the defense attorneys had been the Dream Team of Aaron Burr, Alexander Hamilton, and Henry Brockholst Livingston. This would be produced as a play by Miss Louisa H. Medina that would run for several nights at the Bowery Theatre, and for almost a month at the American Theatre.
December: Though Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s NORMAN LESLIE: A TALE OF THE PRESENT TIMES was immediately very popular, Edgar Allan Poe wrote of it: “Here we have a blistering detail, a blistering truth, a blistering story, and a blistering brand, to say nothing of innumerable other blisters interspersed throughout the book. But we have done with Norman Leslie, — if ever we saw as silly a thing, may be we — blistered.” HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1836
February: Edgar Allan Poe continued his attack on Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s NORMAN LESLIE: A TALE OF THE PRESENT TIMES, which amounted, he insisted, to “the most inestimable piece of balderdash with which the common sense of the good people of America were ever so openly or so villainously insulted.” This would bring on endless discussion, and endless published commentary, and as we Americans well know — all publicity is good publicity.
At Harvard College, Henry Thoreau would be perusing this notorious novel:
NORMAN LESLIE, VOL. I
the blistered author NORMAN LESLIE, VOL. II
WHAT I’M WRITING IS TRUE BUT NEVER MIND YOU CAN ALWAYS LIE TO YOURSELF
Theodore Sedgwick Fay “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1837
Theodore Sedgwick Fay became Secretary to the American Legation in London and was soon forwarded to be Secretary to the American Legation in Berlin (until 1853). One of his delicate challenges while in Berlin would be to prevent, insofar as possible, a frequently intoxicated political appointee named Hannigan from embarrassing the United States of America. HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1839
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s SYDNEY CLIFTON; OR, VICISSITUDES IN BOTH HEMISPHERES. A TALE OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY (two volumes). HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1840
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s THE COUNTESS IDA: A TALE OF BERLIN (two volumes) was written to promote a campaign against dueling. HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1843
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s HOBOKEN, A ROMANCE OF NEW YORK (two volumes) was, like his THE COUNTESS IDA before it, written to help in the ongoing campaign against dueling. HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1844
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s ROBERT RUEFUL (Philadelphia). HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1848
PRINCIPLES OF ZOÖLOGY: TOUCHING THE STRUCTURE, DEVELOPMENT, DISTRIBUTION AND NATURAL ARRANGEMENT OF THE RACES OF ANIMALS, LIVING AND EXTINCT; WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS. FOR THE USE OF SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES. PT. I. COMPARATIVE PHYSIOLOGY. BY LOUIS AGASSIZ, AND AUGUSTUS A. GOULD (Boston: Gould, Kendall and Lincoln. 59, Washington Street).2 PRINCIPLES OF ZOÖLOGY, I
Dr. Gould became a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society.
The Swiss federal constitution. Although Lucerne had played a major role in the old Swiss confederacy and had been proposed earlier in the 19th Century for the federal capital, Berne was chosen due to Lucerne’s opposition to this new constitution.
Theodore Sedgwick Fay would function as the United States’s Chargé d’Affaires during the sittings of the German Parliament at Frankfort. There would occur what was referred to as the “Neuchâtel Affair,” having to
2. Most of the illustrations for this had been prepared by Louis François de Pourtalès (1824-1880), who had followed Professor Agassiz from Switzerland and at this point was joining the US Coast Survey (eventually he would become custodian of Harvard University’s Museum of Comparative Zoology). HDT WHAT? INDEX
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do with the peculiar relationship in which the Canton of Neuchâtel had stood in regard to Prussia, since it had in 1707 fallen by inheritance under Prussian control. In this year Prussia gave tacit consent for the canton to ally itself with the Swiss Confederation.
When the Academy of Neuchâtel closed due to the political unrest of this year’s European politics, Louis Agassiz suggested to Arnold Henri Guyot that he emigrate to the United States. He gave a series of lectures at the Lowell Institute in Boston titled “The Earth and Man” which would in the following year become the basis for a text of the same name.
In front of Nassau Hall at Princeton University now stands the Guyot boulder, a glacial erratic that would be HDT WHAT? INDEX
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sent by Guyot’s former students at the Academy of Neuchâtel.
THE SCIENCE OF 1848 HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1851
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s poetical romance ULRIC; OR, THE VOICES: A TALE (New York). HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1853
March 16, Wednesday: On this day Henry Thoreau made no journal entry.
Theodore Sedgwick Fay was nominated as Minister Resident for Switzerland and Liechtenstein. He would present his credentials in Berne on June 29th, and would serve until 1861. HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1856
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. In this year he was able to successfully mediate between Switzerland and Prussia when the Swiss police discovered a conspiracy of Prussian nobles in Neuchâtel, to deliver that canton back into the hands of Prussia, and incarcerated them. The government of William IV of Prussia threatened armed intervention unless these Prussian nobles were released, and both sides began preparations for war. Then Fay showed up, acting entirely without instruction or sponsorship or authorization, on his own initiative as a concerned private citizen — and managed to calm this thing down.3
3. Some politicians sallied that he should be recalled in disgrace for having exceeded his authority. Cooler heads responded that it might be difficult to disgrace him once his unauthorized action had come to be recognized as so utterly effective and helpful. HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1860
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND.
THE COTTAGES OF THE ALPS: OR, LIFE AND MANNERS IN SWITZERLAND. BY THE AUTHOR OF PEASANT LIFE IN GERMANY [i.e., Anna C. Johnson] WITH ILLUSTRATIONS (New York: Charles Scribner). THE COTTAGES OF THE ALPS: OR, LIFE AND MANNERS IN SWITZERLAND. BY A LADY. ILLUSTRATED WITH THE CRESTS OF THE CANTONS. IN TWO VOLUMES (London: Sampson Low, Son, & Co., 47, Ludgate Hill). HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1861
July 1, Monday: Theodore Sedgwick Fay had since 1853 been Minister Resident for Switzerland and Liechtenstein, at Berne. Upon the election of Abraham Lincoln as president, however, for political reasons, he felt he needed to resign. He would reside during his retirement at Berlin.
On this night and the following night, a maximum tail length of 118 degrees were being reported for the great comet II Tebbutt. The tail was reaching south, from the head directly below Polaris near the northern horizon, to well past the zenith of the southern skies, and was all night rotating about the pole. SKY EVENT HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1867
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s GREAT OUTLINES OF GEOGRAPHY. HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1873
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s FIRST STEPS IN GEOGRAPHY. HDT WHAT? INDEX
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1888
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s HISTORY OF THE THREE GERMANYS. THE THREE GERMANYS - I THE THREE GERMANYS - II HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1897
Theodore Sedgwick Fay’s FORTY DOLLARS AND THE BOOTS; OR, SHALL WE NOT ABOLISH OUR APOSTLES’ CREED? HDT WHAT? INDEX
THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY THEODORE SEDGWICK FAY
1898
November 24, Thursday: Theodore Sedgwick Fay died at Berlin.
“MAGISTERIAL HISTORY” IS FANTASIZING: HISTORY IS CHRONOLOGY
“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Theodore Sedgwick Fay HDT WHAT? INDEX
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COPYRIGHT NOTICE: In addition to the property of others, such as extensive quotations and reproductions of images, this “read-only” computer file contains a great deal of special work product of Austin Meredith, copyright 2014. Access to these interim materials will eventually be offered for a fee in order to recoup some of the costs of preparation. My hypercontext button invention which, instead of creating a hypertext leap through hyperspace —resulting in navigation problems— allows for an utter alteration of the context within which one is experiencing a specific content already being viewed, is claimed as proprietary to Austin Meredith — and therefore freely available for use by all. Limited permission to copy such files, or any material from such files, must be obtained in advance in writing from the “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project, 833 Berkeley St., Durham NC 27705. Please contact the project at
“It’s all now you see. Yesterday won’t be over until tomorrow and tomorrow began ten thousand years ago.” – Remark by character “Garin Stevens” in William Faulkner’s INTRUDER IN THE DUST
Prepared: October 27, 2014 HDT WHAT? INDEX
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ARRGH AUTOMATED RESEARCH REPORT
GENERATION HOTLINE
This stuff presumably looks to you as if it were generated by a human. Such is not the case. Instead, someone has requested that we pull it out of the hat of a pirate who has grown out of the shoulder of our pet parrot “Laura” (as above). What these chronological lists are: they are research reports compiled by ARRGH algorithms out of a database of modules which we term the Kouroo Contexture (this is data mining). To respond to such a request for information we merely push a button. HDT WHAT? INDEX
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Commonly, the first output of the algorithm has obvious deficiencies and we need to go back into the modules stored in the contexture and do a minor amount of tweaking, and then we need to punch that button again and recompile the chronology — but there is nothing here that remotely resembles the ordinary “writerly” process you know and love. As the contents of this originating contexture improve, and as the programming improves, and as funding becomes available (to date no funding whatever has been needed in the creation of this facility, the entire operation being run out of pocket change) we expect a diminished need to do such tweaking and recompiling, and we fully expect to achieve a simulation of a generous and untiring robotic research librarian. Onward and upward in this brave new world.
First come first serve. There is no charge. Place requests with