Tribune Thursday

I can’t believe I stopped doing these for over two months. I’m going to make sure I do one 1908 “above the fold” each week until the end of the year. Here’s today’s:

Left-to-right:

  1. William Howard Taft is getting ready to write his speech accepting the Republican nomination. He’ll be working with Republican National Committee chairman, Frank H. Hitchcock.
  2. Venezuela has recalled its Chargé d’Affaires from Washington in response to Washington having pulled its Chargé from Caracas.
  3. That’s William Jennings Bryan in the photograph. The stories below the picture:

    a. The President denies having told Congressman Richmond Pearson Hobson (D-AL) that the US “would be in the midst of war with Japan within a year”*

    b. The Lusitania is on pace to set a speed record for crossing the ocean. (Note: I’m confused by the end of this article, which seems to say that the ship has finished its voyage – was that information added later but the opening paragraphs were not altered or is there something I’m missing?)
     

  4. William Jennings Bryan has been nominated at the Democratic convention. It looks like it’s not quite official, but that he’s pretty much assured. The paper went to press before everything could be settled, so no word yet on who will be the Vice Presidential nominee. The longer article directly below looks like it was filed even earlier.

*Check out the denial from Roosevelt’s executive secretary:

In reference to the speech of Congressman Hobson, Secretary Loeb stated that the Congressman must, of course, have been misquoted. The President not only never made such a remark, but never made any remark even remotely resembling it. All the President has ever said is that if there was a sufficient navy there would never be any possibility of this country getting into a foreign war.