G&S, Pirates, Darwin and 1984

Gilbert and Sullivan's H.M.S. Pinafore was badly pirated. Hired musicians would sit in the audience transcribing the musical score note for note but missing many of the contemporary puns and social satire. They were sent to America where unauthorized productions not only took money out of their pockets with 19th century copyright laws but produced flawed editions for years. G&S solved this problem by premiering their Pirates in New York and a
legal performance ( a simple rehearsal in a parlor with witnesses) in London the night before.
Intellectual property, properly credited authorship is still a legal and ethical issue today. The unicorn Darwin razor reached Tulip craze prices until several contemporary efforts produced copies and in one case a panic that others were doing same. The original manufacturer is long gone; his finances in ruin taking a shotgun to a heavily bearded face. No worries about infringement there, and the lovely handle ascribed ART DECO by the ignorant is in fact known as CANDELABRA from an Edwardian design for said object. In no small irony another name connected to DARWIN; The tragic captain of H.M.S. Beagle ended his life slitting his own throat with a straight razor; brand unknown.
There is a rather boorish growing social phenomenon in wet shaving. Counterfeiting Super Iridiums in China is one thing. Copying original design with or without legal patent and not only failing to give proper due credit but implying by innuendo or feigned ignorance it is not another. If said
artisan comments a Pandora's Box of vices flies out like biting gnats nervous in their 24 hour ignobility. Then we witness; those with any memory
Orwell's classic of changed information from day to day and finally a complete purge.
It's O.K. boys, you know your mothers will always love you.

I found this in a blog regarding the Darwin Universal safety razor: "Tragically Paul Richard Kuehnrich was still in financial trouble following the introduction and sale of the Darwin Universal. During World War I he and his family suffered much hardships and public scorn due to his German heritage although he had lived in England for 25 years before the war. He committed suicide, shooting himself in the head in his locked library in 1932. It's obvious he didn't use his own invention. Maybe if he had he would have reduced his stressors."
There is a photograph of the man, with a large beard, moustache, and a flower that I mistook for a humongous arachnid.

While I don't know Kuehnrich's full story, it does seem the people don't change. 25 years living in England, but still mistrusted. I know Indian pharmacists that were yelled at regarding where they were on 9/11. They were where they had been for years, working in the corner pharmacy. But their skin color and accent made them suspect, and open to abuse, scorn and ridicule.