August 30, 2023 • 11 mins
England's master gardener, Lancelot "Capability" Brown, was baptized on this day in 1716.
On this day in 1892, the steamship Moravia arrived in New York from Hamburg, Germany, where a cholera epidemic was happening.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey there, history fans. We're taking the next two weeks
off so that I can move across country. But don't worry.
We've got plenty of classic shows to tide you over,
and be sure to tune in on September eleventh for
a brand new episode.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Welcome to This Day in History Class from HowStuffWorks dot
com and from the desk of Stuff you Missed in
History Class. It's the show where we explore the past
one day at a time with a quick look at
what happened today in history. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Tracy V. Wilson. In its August thirtieth, England's greatest gardener,
(00:38):
Lancelot Capability Brown was baptized on this day in seventeen sixteen,
although we don't know exactly his date of birth. If
you have ever watched Dalton Abbey, or even just seen
a picture of the abbey in Dalton Abbey, That's High
Clearcastle its gardens were designed by Lancelot Brown. That nickname
(00:59):
of capable Ability is said to be because he liked
to tell his clients that their landscapes had great capability
for improvement. He was colossally influential in the eighteenth century
in England and Wales, designing gardens and grounds of the
mansions and the country estates, basically creating the look of England.
(01:20):
His style was a huge break away from the idea
of formal gardens, which obviously looked like somebody planned them
out and planted specific things in specific places, and said
he was carefully crafting landscapes that looked deceptively natural. They
looked like they just grew that way. He had trees
and curving ponds and streams and expansive lawns that all
(01:43):
just looked like they were supposed to be there. This
earned him some criticism for designing estates that look like
that was just how they happened, instead of looking like
somebody put effort into it. His whole philosophy was all
about being both comfortable and elegant, and it was also
very proud. These landscapes around these estates were not just
(02:04):
gardens to walk through and be observed. They had different uses.
They were home to different types of animals, different livestock
that was being raised on the property. Brown's gardens were
supposed to serve the needs of the estate, not just
exist for the sake of looking at them. A hallmark
of capability Browns designs was the ha ha. Instead of
(02:26):
a raised fence that very obviously and visibly cut one
part of the state off from another, he'd sink the
land on one side of a wall, creating a barrier
that couldn't be seen at all from the house, while
still keeping the sheep pastured with the sheep instead of
wandering around eating whatever they wanted in other parts of
the estate. Jane Austen fans may remember that ha has
(02:49):
make several appearances in the book Mansfield Park. Obviously, a
sunken wall that is made on purpose to not be
visible isn't necessarily safe to walk around owned near, and
the term haja supposedly comes from a person's surprise at
accidentally tripping over one. Capability Brown's work was very expensive
because the estates that he was designing had enormous grounds.
(03:12):
He wasn't just making a little garden path around to
the side of the house. He was designing the entire
property that he took years to complete and hundreds of
laborers worked on them. Over his career. He designed about
two hundred and fifty estates all over England, but he
didn't really grow wealthy from all of that work. He
(03:32):
had asthma, which affected his health, and he traveled a
lot doing his work. He just was always on the
road from one client to another, and travel at the
time was exhausting and difficult. All of this had an
effect on his overall health, and he also didn't always
charge people for the work that he did. He might
submit an invoice but never really push to collect on it,
(03:54):
or he might go into the project without a very
clear set of expectations or a budget about how much
he was going to be spending on it. He died
suddenly on February sixth of seventeen eighty three, at the
age of sixty six, having worked all the way up
until the end. In a lot of ways, he set
standards for the look of English manor houses and estates
that continue to influence British aesthetics today. And you can
(04:16):
still visit a lot of estates that Brown designed and
walk through gardens that are still pretty much as he
left them, although of course all of the trees that
he planted are bigger now than they were where they
still survive. Thanks to Christopher Hasiotis for his research work
on today's episode and Atari Harrison for her audio work
on this podcast. You can subscribe to This Day in
(04:38):
History Class on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and wherever else
you get your podcasts. Tune in tomorrow for a much
gorrier tale, although it's still set in England.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
Hello, Welcome to This Day in History Class, where we
flip through the book of History and bring you a
new page every day. The day was August thirtieth, eighteen
ninety two. The steamship Moravia arrived in New York Harbor
(05:20):
late in the evening. By this point, twenty two of
the ship's three hundred and fifty eight passengers who had
traveled from Hamburg, Germany, had died from cholera. Cholera is
an infectious disease of the small intestine, usually caused by
contaminated food or water, and it can lead to severe diarrhea, vomiting, dehydration,
(05:44):
and even death. In the late nineteenth century, there was
a cholera pandemic in Asia and Africa that made it
to parts of Europe and South America. A cholera epidemic
broke out in Hamborg in eighteen ninety two because of
contaminated drinking water, and more than half of the people
(06:04):
who were infected died. Americans worried that the epidemic would
reach the United States. Unrestricted and so called undesirable immigration
was already a hot button issue in the country. For
context on the fears and prejudices surrounding immigration at the
time the Chinese Exclusion Act was renewed in eighteen ninety two,
(06:28):
those fears extended to immigration from places that were affected
by cholera. Though Jewish people in Russia were not the
only ones getting cholera or fleeing epidemics, many newspapers and
public health establishments pegged them as the likely carriers of
cholera to the US. One August twenty ninth article in
(06:50):
The New York Times said the following about Hungarians and
Jewish people in Russia, even should they pass the quarantine officials,
their mode of life life when they settled down makes
them always a source of danger. Cholera, it must be remembered,
originates in the homes of this human refraf. Journalists, working
(07:12):
class Americans, and medical professionals called for a suspension of
immigration to keep cholera from spreading to the US, but
by mid August of eighteen ninety two, many ships from
the Port of Hamburg were en route to New York.
Steamships continued carrying steerage immigrants out of Hamburg even after
(07:33):
health officials admitted that there was a cholera epidemic. The
people aboard those ships were coming from places that had
been widely affected by cholera. One of those ships was
the Moravia, which left Homborg on August seventeenth. Only a
couple of days after the trip began, Russian and Polish
(07:53):
Jewish people, as well as German and French folks, began
getting symptoms of cramping, thom and diarrhea, which progressed to
coma and death. Between August nineteenth and twenty ninth, twenty
two people died and two more were ill. Upon arrival
in the New York Quarantine Station on the night of Tuesday,
(08:15):
August thirtieth, one correspondent reported that people who died were
wrapped in canvas and thrown overboard with their belongings. The
Health officer of the Port of New York, members of
the New York City Board of Health, and physicians from
the US Marine Hospital Service dealt with the cholera affected
(08:36):
ships that arrived in New York Harbor from Hamburg. A
quarantine had been placed over the port of New York,
which led to the poor treatment of immigrants and the
confinement of thousands of people on steamships and islands, including
those who did not have cholera. The same day that
the Moravia arrived in New York, Health Officer William Jenkins
(09:00):
announced that only steerage passengers, as opposed to first and
second class passengers, would be inspected, disinfected, and detained for
about five days for observation, and the US Treasury Department's
Immigration Bureau let people into New York from Hamburg as
long as steamship companies put steerage passengers in slower, older
(09:24):
ships and cabin class passengers in faster, newer ships. This
separation allowed cabin class passengers to be quickly inspected, and
it allowed the fast detention of immigrant passengers aboard the
slower ships. The Moravia was the first slow moving pest
ship to arrive in New York from Hamburg. Its passengers
(09:47):
were sent to Hoffman Island, where they were bathed and
their clothes were fumigated. Jenkins ordered that they be quarantined
for as long as necessary. As they remained in quarantine
more ships arrived and were quarantined. US President Benjamin Harrison
issued in order for a nationwide twenty day quarantine of
(10:10):
ships from foreign ports carrying immigrants. The twenty day period
applied to steerage immigrant passengers, but not cabin passengers, and
state authorities could decide to keep people in quarantine for
more time in special cases. But by early September, there
were no new cases of cholera on the Moravia, and
(10:32):
the cholera epidemic was over by the end of September,
But all the conflicts that had arisen among state and
federal officials over management of the epidemic led to a
desire for changes in public health and immigration laws. In
eighteen ninety three, President Harrison signed into law the National
(10:54):
Quarantine Act, which created a national system of quarantine while
still allowing for state run quarantines. It also puts standards
in place for medically inspecting immigrants, ships and cargoes. I'm Eaves, Jeffcote,
and hopefully you know a little more about history today
than you did yesterday. Tune in tomorrow for another Day
(11:18):
in History.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple
Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Hey there, history fans. We're taking the next two weeks
off so that I can move across country. But don't worry.
We've got plenty of classic shows to tide you over,
and be sure to tune in on September eleventh for
a brand new episode.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Welcome to This Day in History Class from HowStuffWorks dot
com and from the desk of Stuff you Missed in
History Class. It's the show where we explore the past
one day at a time with a quick look at
what happened today in history. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Tracy V. Wilson. In its August thirtieth, England's greatest gardener,
(00:38):
Lancelot Capability Brown was baptized on this day in seventeen sixteen,
although we don't know exactly his date of birth. If
you have ever watched Dalton Abbey, or even just seen
a picture of the abbey in Dalton Abbey, That's High
Clearcastle its gardens were designed by Lancelot Brown. That nickname
(00:59):
of capable Ability is said to be because he liked
to tell his clients that their landscapes had great capability
for improvement. He was colossally influential in the eighteenth century
in England and Wales, designing gardens and grounds of the
mansions and the country estates, basically creating the look of England.
(01:20):
His style was a huge break away from the idea
of formal gardens, which obviously looked like somebody planned them
out and planted specific things in specific places, and said
he was carefully crafting landscapes that looked deceptively natural. They
looked like they just grew that way. He had trees
and curving ponds and streams and expansive lawns that all
(01:43):
just looked like they were supposed to be there. This
earned him some criticism for designing estates that look like
that was just how they happened, instead of looking like
somebody put effort into it. His whole philosophy was all
about being both comfortable and elegant, and it was also
very proud. These landscapes around these estates were not just
(02:04):
gardens to walk through and be observed. They had different uses.
They were home to different types of animals, different livestock
that was being raised on the property. Brown's gardens were
supposed to serve the needs of the estate, not just
exist for the sake of looking at them. A hallmark
of capability Browns designs was the ha ha. Instead of
(02:26):
a raised fence that very obviously and visibly cut one
part of the state off from another, he'd sink the
land on one side of a wall, creating a barrier
that couldn't be seen at all from the house, while
still keeping the sheep pastured with the sheep instead of
wandering around eating whatever they wanted in other parts of
the estate. Jane Austen fans may remember that ha has
(02:49):
make several appearances in the book Mansfield Park. Obviously, a
sunken wall that is made on purpose to not be
visible isn't necessarily safe to walk around owned near, and
the term haja supposedly comes from a person's surprise at
accidentally tripping over one. Capability Brown's work was very expensive
because the estates that he was designing had enormous grounds.
(03:12):
He wasn't just making a little garden path around to
the side of the house. He was designing the entire
property that he took years to complete and hundreds of
laborers worked on them. Over his career. He designed about
two hundred and fifty estates all over England, but he
didn't really grow wealthy from all of that work. He
(03:32):
had asthma, which affected his health, and he traveled a
lot doing his work. He just was always on the
road from one client to another, and travel at the
time was exhausting and difficult. All of this had an
effect on his overall health, and he also didn't always
charge people for the work that he did. He might
submit an invoice but never really push to collect on it,
(03:54):
or he might go into the project without a very
clear set of expectations or a budget about how much
he was going to be spending on it. He died
suddenly on February sixth of seventeen eighty three, at the
age of sixty six, having worked all the way up
until the end. In a lot of ways, he set
standards for the look of English manor houses and estates
that continue to influence British aesthetics today. And you can
(04:16):
still visit a lot of estates that Brown designed and
walk through gardens that are still pretty much as he
left them, although of course all of the trees that
he planted are bigger now than they were where they
still survive. Thanks to Christopher Hasiotis for his research work
on today's episode and Atari Harrison for her audio work
on this podcast. You can subscribe to This Day in
(04:38):
History Class on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and wherever else
you get your podcasts. Tune in tomorrow for a much
gorrier tale, although it's still set in England.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
Hello, Welcome to This Day in History Class, where we
flip through the book of History and bring you a
new page every day. The day was August thirtieth, eighteen
ninety two. The steamship Moravia arrived in New York Harbor
(05:20):
late in the evening. By this point, twenty two of
the ship's three hundred and fifty eight passengers who had
traveled from Hamburg, Germany, had died from cholera. Cholera is
an infectious disease of the small intestine, usually caused by
contaminated food or water, and it can lead to severe diarrhea, vomiting, dehydration,
(05:44):
and even death. In the late nineteenth century, there was
a cholera pandemic in Asia and Africa that made it
to parts of Europe and South America. A cholera epidemic
broke out in Hamborg in eighteen ninety two because of
contaminated drinking water, and more than half of the people
(06:04):
who were infected died. Americans worried that the epidemic would
reach the United States. Unrestricted and so called undesirable immigration
was already a hot button issue in the country. For
context on the fears and prejudices surrounding immigration at the
time the Chinese Exclusion Act was renewed in eighteen ninety two,
(06:28):
those fears extended to immigration from places that were affected
by cholera. Though Jewish people in Russia were not the
only ones getting cholera or fleeing epidemics, many newspapers and
public health establishments pegged them as the likely carriers of
cholera to the US. One August twenty ninth article in
(06:50):
The New York Times said the following about Hungarians and
Jewish people in Russia, even should they pass the quarantine officials,
their mode of life life when they settled down makes
them always a source of danger. Cholera, it must be remembered,
originates in the homes of this human refraf. Journalists, working
(07:12):
class Americans, and medical professionals called for a suspension of
immigration to keep cholera from spreading to the US, but
by mid August of eighteen ninety two, many ships from
the Port of Hamburg were en route to New York.
Steamships continued carrying steerage immigrants out of Hamburg even after
(07:33):
health officials admitted that there was a cholera epidemic. The
people aboard those ships were coming from places that had
been widely affected by cholera. One of those ships was
the Moravia, which left Homborg on August seventeenth. Only a
couple of days after the trip began, Russian and Polish
(07:53):
Jewish people, as well as German and French folks, began
getting symptoms of cramping, thom and diarrhea, which progressed to
coma and death. Between August nineteenth and twenty ninth, twenty
two people died and two more were ill. Upon arrival
in the New York Quarantine Station on the night of Tuesday,
(08:15):
August thirtieth, one correspondent reported that people who died were
wrapped in canvas and thrown overboard with their belongings. The
Health officer of the Port of New York, members of
the New York City Board of Health, and physicians from
the US Marine Hospital Service dealt with the cholera affected
(08:36):
ships that arrived in New York Harbor from Hamburg. A
quarantine had been placed over the port of New York,
which led to the poor treatment of immigrants and the
confinement of thousands of people on steamships and islands, including
those who did not have cholera. The same day that
the Moravia arrived in New York, Health Officer William Jenkins
(09:00):
announced that only steerage passengers, as opposed to first and
second class passengers, would be inspected, disinfected, and detained for
about five days for observation, and the US Treasury Department's
Immigration Bureau let people into New York from Hamburg as
long as steamship companies put steerage passengers in slower, older
(09:24):
ships and cabin class passengers in faster, newer ships. This
separation allowed cabin class passengers to be quickly inspected, and
it allowed the fast detention of immigrant passengers aboard the
slower ships. The Moravia was the first slow moving pest
ship to arrive in New York from Hamburg. Its passengers
(09:47):
were sent to Hoffman Island, where they were bathed and
their clothes were fumigated. Jenkins ordered that they be quarantined
for as long as necessary. As they remained in quarantine
more ships arrived and were quarantined. US President Benjamin Harrison
issued in order for a nationwide twenty day quarantine of
(10:10):
ships from foreign ports carrying immigrants. The twenty day period
applied to steerage immigrant passengers, but not cabin passengers, and
state authorities could decide to keep people in quarantine for
more time in special cases. But by early September, there
were no new cases of cholera on the Moravia, and
(10:32):
the cholera epidemic was over by the end of September,
But all the conflicts that had arisen among state and
federal officials over management of the epidemic led to a
desire for changes in public health and immigration laws. In
eighteen ninety three, President Harrison signed into law the National
(10:54):
Quarantine Act, which created a national system of quarantine while
still allowing for state run quarantines. It also puts standards
in place for medically inspecting immigrants, ships and cargoes. I'm Eaves, Jeffcote,
and hopefully you know a little more about history today
than you did yesterday. Tune in tomorrow for another Day
(11:18):
in History.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple
Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
This Day in History Class News
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Gabe Luzier
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