Newspapers across the country noted the death in 1910 of Henry Ziegenhein, a former St. Louis mayor who became famous a decade earlier for a flippant remark about the street lighting situation in the city.
“We got a moon yet, ain’t it?” is what old “Uncle Henry” supposedly said, a quip that was widely repeated, and immortalized by Lincoln Steffens, who used it in “Tweed Days in St. Louis,” the famous expose on St. Louis published by McClure’s in 1902.
The line, in fact, has been repeated over and over — including by the Post-Dispatch — whenever there’s talk about the provincialism and corruption of what was once the nation’s fourth-largest city.
But a review of the archives suggests the quote is an invention of the Post-Dispatch. Or at least the product of creative license.
By way of background, the city switched lighting systems in 1900, but the removal of old lights by one contractor outpaced the installation of new lighting by another contractor. The Post-Dispatch, on Aug. 31, 1900, reported about three-fourths of the city would be left at least temporarily without street lighting. Ziegenhein, the newspaper reported, had urged the old contractor to delay removal, but he was too late. The next day, Ziegenhein was asked about the unfortunate situation, which was clearly something City Hall had botched, and the Post-Dispatch reported the mayor’s response as: “Well, there’s one good thing. We’re going to have a moon tonight.”
A week later, the Post-Dispatch began the first of several cartoons depicting the mayor as a smiling, buffoonish moon above the darkened skyline of the city. “We got a moon yet, ain’t it?” made its first appearance as part of a silly rhyme accompanying the cartoon.
The shades of night were falling fast
As through the darkened city passed
A mayor whose smile was broad and nice,
Whose banner bore this strange device”
“We got a moon yet, ain’t it?”
Poor Ziegenhein, a Republican, was repeatedly hammered for the quote the Post-Dispatch invented, and gleeful Democrats took it up as their slogan.
He was defeated the following year, and returned to private life, where he headed a local bank until his death. (Originally published Oct. 28, 2023)
Roland Klose 