I just received a beautiful old edition of Les Misérables I’d ordered and, upon opening it, found a wonderfully well-preserved four-leaf clover at the title page – and another inside the second volume. The edition is from a little after 1890, but there’s no way of telling how old the clovers are; they’re quite brittle, though, so it’s clear they aren’t a recent addition. A very pleasant surprise that makes this already excellent copy even more precious. (larger images)

In 1896, a temporary town called Crush (named after the railway agent leading the effort) was erected in Texas for the sole purpose of exhibiting, on September 15, a head-on collision between two freight trains. 40,000 people attended the event. When the trains collided, the boiler of one exploded, sending fragments of metal into the crowd, injuring many (including the photographer taking the second photograph above) and killing two.