The Emperor Norton Trust

TO HONOR THE LIFE + ADVANCE THE LEGACY OF JOSHUA ABRAHAM NORTON

RESEARCH • EDUCATION • ADVOCACY

Filtering by Tag: 1939

When Emperor Norton Became Protector of Mexico

October 18, 2024  /  John Lumea

A certain conventional wisdom holds that Emperor Norton adopted the title "Protector of Mexico" around the time French emperor Napoleon III invaded Mexico in 1862 and installed his puppet ruler Maximilian I in 1864 — and that the Emperor dropped his "Protector" title a few years later.

The documentary record says otherwise.

Evidence suggests that Emperor Norton did not start using "Protector of Mexico" until early 1866, more than halfway into Maximilian’s tenure, but makes clear that he kept using the title — both to advocate for Mexico and for general purposes — for the rest of his life.

A surprising find: Norton I expanded his title to "Emperor of the United States and Mexico" in 1861.

By the time the Emperor assumed his protectorship of Mexico, he had relinquished his emperorship of that country.

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categories / Research, Proclamations, Original sources
tags / Mexico, Emperor of the United States and Mexico, Protector of Mexico, Napoleon III, Maximilian I, Robert Ernest Cowan, Albert Dressler, Allen Stanley Lane, William Drury, Emperor Norton Memorial Association, Woodlawn Cemetery, headstone, 1860, 1861, 1862, 1864, 1865, 1866, 1871, 1874, 1875, 1876, 1879, 1923, 1927, 1934, 1938, 1939, 1986

A Tale of Two Storeships

November 21, 2023  /  John Lumea

For some eight decades, maybe more, the story has circulated in Emperor Norton biographies and in Nortonland more broadly that Joshua Norton owned the Genessee — the storeship that “received” the hundred tons of rice that Joshua’s firm bought off a ship in San Francisco Bay in December 1852.

According to this story, the Genessee was a major asset of Joshua Norton & Co., with the firm using the storeship as a warehouse and doing a brisk business in renting out space in the ship to other merchants.

In fact, the only contemporaneous documentation of a connection between Joshua Norton and the Genessee makes it very clear that Joshua was the renter. He did not own the Genessee — he simply rented warehouse space there, as many other traders and merchants did.

However, we recently uncovered a previously undocumented newspaper ad which suggests that — more than two years earlier, in August 1850 — Joshua Norton did lease space in a different storeship, the Orator, with the intention of sub-leasing this space to others.

Read on for documentation of the original arrivals of the Genessee and the Orator in San Francisco — of when these cargo / passenger ships were sold and converted into storeships — of how Joshua Norton’s path intersected with the Genessee and the Orator — and of these ships’ later fates.

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categories / Research, Places, Original sources
tags / ship, storeship, Genessee, Orator, California Street Wharf, Ruiz v. Norton, California Supreme Court, James McCormic, Ferdinand Vassault, Allen Stanley Lane, William Drury, 1850, 1851, 1852, 1853, 1854, 1856, 1882, 1939, 1986

The Genesis of the Second "Joshua Norton & Co." of San Francisco

November 16, 2023  /  John Lumea

Conventional wisdom holds that, when Joshua Norton arrived in San Francisco, he immediately found a business partner and established Joshua Norton & Co. — and that this firm operated continuously until the legal and financial fallout from Joshua’s prolonged rice contract dispute left him deserted and on his own.

But, a close reading of the newspaper record indicates that, during his first 3½ years in San Francisco, Joshua Norton alternated between periods of working with a partner (“& Co.”) and working as a sole proprietor — and that there were three distinct business partnerships that operated under the name “Joshua Norton & Co.”

The primary 20th-century biographers of Emperor Norton identify Joshua’s first business partner as Peter Robertson. But, our recent discovery of details that apparently were missed by these authors suggests that Joshua and Peter did not meet until nearly a year into Joshua’s San Francisco sojourn — and that they met at a time when the “original” Joshua Norton & Co. already had disappeared from view and Joshua was once again working solo.

The circumstantial evidence points to Peter Robertson as the partner in the second Joshua Norton & Co — not the first.

Read on for the full story.

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categories / Research, Places, Original sources
tags / Joshua Norton, Joshua Norton & Co., Peter Robertson, 242 Montgomery Street, Cross Hobson & Co., Sansome Street, Jackson Street, Pacific Street, William Sim, partner, partnership, newspaper, directory, advertisement, ad, Allen Stanley Lane, William Drury, 1849, 1850, 1851, 1852, 1853, 1854, 1855, 1939, 1986

The Pantheonic Statuette of Norton I

May 30, 2023  /  John Lumea

It’s well known that souvenir photographs and lithographs of Emperor Norton were sold in San Francisco shops during the Emperor’s lifetime.

Norton biographer William Drury takes it considerably further to claim that, by the early 1870s, there was a whole cottage industry of “Emperor Norton statuettes, Emperor Norton dolls, Emperor Norton mugs and jugs, Emperor Norton Imperial Cigars” — and even that there were peddlers hawking Emperor Norton merch at his funeral.

I find no evidence to support much of what Drury asserts — but…

In 1877 — a couple of years before Emperor Norton died in 1880 — a German immigrant jeweler and sculptor in San Francisco created a highly accomplished statuette of the Emperor that deserves a much closer look than it has received.

Although there is no ready evidence that this nearly-two-foot-tall statuette was sold in shops, there is evidence to suggest that it was a fixture in San Francisco saloons — and even that the Emperor himself had a copy in his apartment.

Among other things, I document here the three known copies of the statuette and offer a glimpse into the life and work of the sculptor.

There even are cameo appearances from historians of Ancient Rome and the Oxford English Dictionary.

It’s a fascinating story, previously untold.

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categories / Research, Original sources, Tributes, ARENA
tags / Art, sculpture, statue, statuette, figurine, Herman J. Brand, Jonas Brand, jeweler, sculptor, plaster, medallion, token, charm, gold, saloon, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Society of California Pioneers, Wells Fargo History Museum, Santa Rosa Press Democrat, Allen Stanley Lane, William Drury, photograph, cabinet card, painting, lithograph, terra cotta, Pantheon, pantheonic, Rome, Oxford English Dictionary, 1862, 1865, 1867, 1868, 1869, 1872, 1876, 1877, 1878, 1879, 1880, 1881, 1883, 1906, 1921, 1930, 1935, 1939, 1986, 2021

Early 1950s Push to Find a Home for Storied But Snubbed Emperor Norton Plaque

July 07, 2021  /  John Lumea

When the fraternity of E Clampus Vitus sought in 1939 to place a plaque honoring Emperor Norton at the Transbay Terminal, in San Francisco, the California Toll Bridge Authority — the developer and de facto owner of the Terminal — said No.

Finally, in 1955, the plaque was installed at the Cliff House. But, a lingering question has been: What did the Clampers do to find a home for the plaque in the 16 years between 1939 and 1955?

Certainly, World War II made it difficult to push the project forward. But, even allowing for that, we’ve uncovered some news accounts suggesting that there was more behind-the-scenes activity than previously thought.

It appears that the Clampers continued to make appeals to the Bridge Authority for at least 18 months in 1939 and 1940.

And, the effort that resulted in getting the plaque at the Cliff House in 1955 started at least 5 years earlier, in 1950 — with several brick walls on the path to the first proper dedication.

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categories / Research, Original sources, Bay Bridge, ARENA
tags / plaque, E Clampus Vitus, William Gordon Huff, Transbay Terminal, Commercial Street, Downieville, Cliff House, Molloy's Tavern, Colma, Eric A. Falconer, 1939, 1940, 1950, 1953, 1955

Norton Biographer Allen Stanley Lane’s Presentation Copy Twofer

June 22, 2021  /  John Lumea

Allen Lane wrote the first of only two book-length biographies of Emperor Norton that have been published.

The book hit the shops in February 1939.

Last week, I acquired a very special presentation copy of Lane’s biography. In fact, it’s the copy that Lane gifted to his parents on their anniversary, when the book was published.

Information in the inscription prompted me to do some digging into Lane’s story — something that long has been something of a mystery in Norton circles. What I discovered will be new, I think, to those who know Lane only as a Norton biographer.

Read on to learn more about Lane — and to get the second part of the twofer.

Includes an image of Lane’s inscription and a rare photograph of Lane that he included with the book.

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categories / Research, Original sources
tags / Allen Stanley Lane, book, presentation copy, inscription, San Diego, Santa Rosa, Los Angeles, Sacramento, organist, theater, Tivoli, Metropolitan, Senator, Hippodrome, Caxton Printers, E Clampus Vitus, plaque, William Gordon Huff, George Napoleon Lane, Laura Pearl Brown, postmaster, 1885, 1886, 1889, 1924, 1928, 1939, 1967

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