Whose Birthday Is It? March 12, 2016

Captain Charles Cunningham Boycott (1832)

Boycott was the estate agent for the Earl ofErne, an absentee landowner in County Mayo,Ireland, at a time when the Irish Land Leaguewas pressing for agrarian reform. In 1880,Boycott’s refusal to reduce rents for tenantfarmers, combined with his attempted evictionof 11 of them, led the League to launch acampaign of ostracism and isolation—nowknown as a “boycott”—against him and his family. Upon findinghimself suddenly without servants, farmhands, or local services,Boycott did what? More…