Women routinely caught fire in the mid-19th century

boingboing.net ^ | 12/22/17 | CORY DOCTOROW

[wally_bert]

That would have been a really interesting Quincy episode.

[Redwood71]

They didn’t chop wood at 12 degrees below.

rwood

[Rebelbase]

“leisure suits”

Gack!

[dfwgator]

[JoeProBono]

Archduchess Mathilde of Austria-Teschen (left) and sister, Archduchess Maria Theresia

[outofsalt]

My wife is also a ginger.
Q: What’s the difference between a red head and a vampire?
A: One is a pale, bloodsucking creature that avoids the sun.
The other is a vampire.

[gnarledmaw]

"Don’t forget to remind those of long hair to similarly exercise extreme caution when working around machinery..."

And tails. One production environment I worked in promoted the idea of wearing costumes on Halloween as a moral thing, had a competition, etc. One guy showed up as a cow and his tail got sucked in. I didnt see it, Im told his backside followed it in a ways before he got extracted. He should just be glad the accident didnt start with his costumes udders...

[gnarledmaw]

My dad was a welder. He hated buying new work clothes and just having it destroyed so he would go to rummage sales and come home with paper grocery bags full of clothes that he had paid 10 cents per piece for. For awhile a lot of that stuff was some kind of leftovers from the disco era. He didnt ever catch totally on fire but often came home looking like he had been hosed down with birdshot and holes burned into his flesh. He would just chuck the clothes and pick out another mismatched circus colored collision of rags the next day. He always just blew off the burns as part of the job.

He said he was just glad not to be "back on the farm." Makes one wonder what things must have been like on that farm. Different sort of characters in those days.

[ladyjane]

You can visit Longfellow’s house in Cambridge, MA. They have concerts there and talks about Longfellow and his family. It is right down the street from where the village blacksmith was located. The house is beautifully restored and looks out over a large park and the Charles River.

BTW Washington used the house as his headquarters for a while. Here are some pictures and history.

http://dlstewart.com/longfellow/CraigieHouse.htm

[Flag_This]

"So is the author saying this is due to bigotry and misogyny?"

That was my impression. Why, oh why, did the men of that dark and benighted time force the wimmens to wear charcloth?

[ladyjane]

If you do any genealogy or visit old cemeteries you’ll see many tombstones for young women who died in their 20’s and 30’s. It’s not uncommon to see a man who died in his 80’s who is buried with his multiple young wives. Childbirth is risky.

[Fightin Whitey]

What if they had to go?

Same thing happens to men, wearing longjohns, two or three layers of shirts, woolie pants and a warm vest and jacket, a heavy belt laden with knife, ammo, gps and rangefinder, with a backpack on top of all that, two hours before dawn at 5 degrees fahrenheit at the trailhead leading into snow/ice covered mountains on the first day of elk hunting.

The second and third day too.

[morphing libertarian]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toilet

[Rebelbase]

I bet they lit up faster than a month old Christmas tree.

[Clay Moore]

Typically it is not the burn itself that kills you, it is the subsequent infection.

[husky ed]

I'm sure that lessons the pain she endured for those three days ;-/

Ed

[moovova]

So that’s where the term “flaming homosexuals” came from. I guess cross-dressing was a “thing” back then too.

[jmacusa]

Whoa Nellie! If the wife saw this post it’s bang zoom to the moon! My wife’s maiden name is Rommel. I kid you not! Merry Christmas.

[jmacusa]

Merry Christmas. My side is all Irish. My wife's maiden name is Rommel. I kid you not. When she gets to cleaning house it's done and over in two hours. Dusted, dishes done, vacuumed top and bottom, load of wash in the machine, dried and folded like she was rolling up France in a Mk 4 panzer!

[Aliska]

Excellent advice! Thank you. Years ago locally a girl working in a plant got her hair caught in machinery. I don't think it killed her, but it must have been horrible.