Republican Party (United States)
Founded in 1854, the GOP originally subscribed to classical liberalism and took ideological stands that were anti-slavery and pro-economic reform. Abraham Lincoln was the first Republican president in the history of the United States. The party was usually dominant over the Democrats during the Third Party System and Fourth Party System. In 1912, Theodore Roosevelt formed the Progressive ("Bull Moose") Party after being rejected by the GOP and ran as a third-party presidential candidate. Roosevelt called for many social reforms, some of which were later championed by New Deal Democrats in the 1930s. He lost the 1912 election, and when most of his supporters returned to the GOP, they were at odds with the party's new conservative economic stance; many left for the Democratic Party, and an ideological shift to the right occurred in the Republican Party. Later in the 20th century, the liberal Republican element was overwhelmed by a conservative surge begun by Barry Goldwater in 1964 and continued during the Reagan Era.
Bull running
The earliest documented instance of bull running appears in 1389, among medieval guild records collected by Joshua Toulmin Smith. The document—from Stamford's "Gild of St. Martin"—states that "on the feast of St. Martin, this gild, by custom beyond reach of memory, has a bull; which bull is hunted [not "baited"] by dogs, and then sold; whereupon the bretheren and sisteren sit down to feast." The phrase "custom beyond reach of memory" leaves uncertainty about whether the custom pre-dated the guild—which was established by 1329—or was instituted by the guild itself. Local folklore in Stamford maintained that the tradition was begun by William de Warenne, 5th Earl of Surrey, during the reign of King John (1199—1216). The story, recorded by Richard Butcher in his "The Survey and Antiquitie of Stamford Towne" (1646), and described by Walsh as "patently fictional", relates how Warenne:
A similar origin-story involving a noble is found at Tutbury, Staffordshire, where the tradition was said to have been started by John of Gaunt shortly after he married his Spanish wife, Constance of Castile, in 1372, in an effort to remind her of her home. The story was first advanced—purely as speculation—by Robert Plot in his "The Natural History of Stafford-Shire" (1686), where he writes:
Samuel Pegge, addressing the Society of Antiquaries in 1765, dismissed Plot's conjecture as "entirely mistaken", while lamenting that it had become received wisdom in the interim. While John of Gaunt had established a Court of Minstrels at Tutbury in 1381, the bull running appears instead to have been instituted by the prior of Tutbury Priory (founded c.1080 as a dependency of the abbey at Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives) as part of the Feast of the Assumption celebrations which, as early as 1230, required the prior to provide "a great feast". Pegge also notes that the bull used for running was provided by the prior, and that the animal "was turned out antiently at the abbey-gate, and by the prior; John of Gaunt or his officers being no way employed in that service."