Post by MOBO on Mar 28, 2024 14:31:06 GMT
The question in this week's Quiz concerning Whitehead reminded me of an incident when I was invited to give a talk on the Naval Career of Captain Georg Von Trapp to a branch of the Women's Institute. I think they thought it was going to be about nuns and singing children (which sounds like one of the levels in Dante's vision of hell to me). Because Von Trapp's first wife was Whitehead's granddaughter the torpedo man was bound to make an entrance at some point. This left me with a problem. Whitehead was so well known that King Edward VII had taken to calling a part of his anatomy his 'Whitehead Torpedo' and was forever sending coded messages to his array of mistresses instructing them to be prepared to be fired at.
Up to this point I had been able to give the information to a variety of audiences-predominantly male and mixed. However, this was the first time I had given the talk to a female audience and everything was going well. But now one of the best known of the King's mistresses the blunt speaking and foul mouthed Lily Langtry had to make an entrance. On one occasion when she was disinclined to succumb to the torpedo he grumbled I've spent enough on you to build a battleship whereupon she replied and enough in me to float one.
Should I tell the ladies this and sound like Bernard Manning or censor my talk. To be fair they looked more AK47 and petrol bombs than Jam and Jerusalem and I did not want to be patronising so I went ahead and told them. The response was a collective, horrified gasp and one shriek followed by a shocked silence. The talk ended in a subdued atmosphere..
I have given the talk many times since but have never received another invitation from the WI.
Up to this point I had been able to give the information to a variety of audiences-predominantly male and mixed. However, this was the first time I had given the talk to a female audience and everything was going well. But now one of the best known of the King's mistresses the blunt speaking and foul mouthed Lily Langtry had to make an entrance. On one occasion when she was disinclined to succumb to the torpedo he grumbled I've spent enough on you to build a battleship whereupon she replied and enough in me to float one.
Should I tell the ladies this and sound like Bernard Manning or censor my talk. To be fair they looked more AK47 and petrol bombs than Jam and Jerusalem and I did not want to be patronising so I went ahead and told them. The response was a collective, horrified gasp and one shriek followed by a shocked silence. The talk ended in a subdued atmosphere..
I have given the talk many times since but have never received another invitation from the WI.