The Man Who Was Emperor of America

In 1859, a bankrupt businessman named Joshua Norton walked into the offices of the San Francisco Evening Bulletin and handed the editor a piece of paper. It announced that he, Joshua Norton, was now Emperor of the United States.

The remarkable thing is not that he did this. People do strange things after losing their fortunes. The remarkable thing is that San Francisco said, essentially, sure.

Restaurants fed him for free. Theaters saved him the best seat on opening nights. He printed his own currency, and shops actually accepted it. He wore a secondhand military uniform with gold epaulettes and a beaver hat topped with a peacock feather, and he spent his days inspecting sidewalks, checking that police officers were at their posts, and issuing proclamations to newspapers, which they dutifully published.

When a young policeman once arrested him for lunacy, the city erupted. Newspapers ran furious editorials. The police chief personally apologized. Norton magnanimously pardoned everyone involved.

He reigned for twenty-one years. When he died in 1880, thirty thousand people came to his funeral.