Oscar Wilde arrived in America on the ship the S.S. Arizona on this day in 1882 for a lecture tour. Originally planned to last four months, it continued for more than a year due to the commercial success. "It's not whether I did it or not that's important, but whether people believed I did it". -- Oscar Wilde's response when asked on his North American tour to explain reports that he had paraded down Piccadilly in London carrying a lily, long hair flowing. (Illustration: Keller cartoon from the "Wasp" of San Francisco depicting Wilde on the occasion of his visit there in 1882)