Since Christmas is often considered a time of peace, the date of this festival is no coincidence. Once the fights are over, a greater peace is restored, helping the community to move into the new year free from any hostility they might’ve felt towards their neighbor.
December 16, 1938 -
MGM released its film version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, on this date.
This was the only film in which Gene Lockhart appeared with his wife Kathleen Lockhart and their daughter June Lockhart.
December 16, 1951 -
NBC-TV debuted Dragnet in a special preview on Chesterfield Sound Off Time on this date. (The show began officially on January 3, 1952.)
The series opener ran in real time, and it contained several clock-on-the-wall shots to keep track of time. The story starts with the police frantically trying to meet a 26-minute deadline to satisfy the demands of a terrorist. The show ran for 26 minutes, excluding commercials.
December 16, 1959 -
20th Century Fox releases the Jules Verne science fiction classic, Journey to the Center of the Earth, starring Pat Boone, James Mason and Arlene Dahl, on this date.
James Mason replaced an ailing Clifton Webb in the part of Professor Lindenbrook before filming began. Alexander Scourby started shooting at Carlsbad Caverns in the Count Saknussemm role, but the producers were unhappy with him and he was replaced with Thayer David.
December 16, 1962 -
David Lean's epic (in ever sense of the word) bio-pix of T. E. Lawrence, Lawrence of Arabia, starring Peter O'Toole, Alec Guinness, Anthony Quinn, Jack Hawkins and Omar Sharif premiered in NYC on this date.
On his first location scouting trip in Jordan, director David Lean discovered the remains of the Turkish locomotives and railroad tracks T.E. Lawrence had destroyed during the Arab Revolution. After forty years in the sun, they hadn't even rusted.
December 16, 1965 -
One of the classic cold war thrillers, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, starring Richard Burton, premiered in the US on this date.
Author John le Carré worked for British Intelligence MI5 and MI6 during the 1950s and 1960s and worked in Berlin where this movie is partially set. Le Carré was there when the Berlin Wall was being constructed. Le Carré drew on this real-life experience when he wrote the novel of The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. The novel is set about a year after the Berlin Wall was built.
December 16, 1966 -
Jimi Hendrix' first single Hey Joe is released on this date.
This is the song that started it all for Hendrix. After being discharged from the US Army in 1962, he worked as a backing musician for The Isley Brothers and Little Richard, and in 1966 performed under the name Jimmy James in the group Jimmy James and the Blue Flames. Hendrix introduced Hey Joe to the band and added it to their setlist. During a show at the Greenwich Village club Cafe Wha?, Chas Chandler of The Animals was in the audience, and he knew instantly that Hendrix was the man to record the song.
December 15, 1971 -
Frank Zappa's 200 Motels film opened at London's Piccadilly Classic Cinema in the UK. The film which also featured Ringo Star, covers a loose storyline about The Mothers of Invention going crazy in the small town Centerville.
While Frank Zappa appears extensively in this movie, either conducting the orchestra or playing his guitar, he neither sings nor speaks.
December 16, 1971 -
Don McLean's eight-minute-plus version of American Pie was released and became one of the longest songs to ever hit the pop charts.
If you prefer the clip with Don singing in it, here you go.
Kids, use the song as the Cliff Notes (Shmoop, if you prefer) for what happened during the 60s (do they still print Cliff Notes?)
December 16, 1972 -
Soul singer Billy Paul's single, Me and Mrs. Jones hit No. 1 on the Billboard charts on this date.
A hint about this song's subject matter is cleverly "hidden" in its intro: the saxophone is playing the first line from a 1953 Doris Day hit entitled Secret Love, which won the Oscar for Best Original Song (Day sang it in the movie Calamity Jane).
December 16, 1975 -
The groundbreaking sitcom (for it's time) One Day At A Time starring Bonnie Franklin, Mackenzie Phillips and Valerie Bertinelli premiered on this date.
Mackenzie Phillips and Valerie Bertinelli are only five months apart in age. Bertinelli was the younger of the two, so Phillips was cast as the older sister.
December 16, 1977 -
Saturday Night Fever, starring John Travolta, went into general release on this date.
Oh John, what a long strange trip it's been since that polyester shirt.
When Tony's dad hits him in the back of the head during dinner, his retort of "just watch the hair!" and complained about being hit on the hair after he had worked on it was John Travolta's own reaction and not scripted, but since it was so in character for Tony Manero to say, it was left in.
The movie was originally called Tribal Rites of the New Saturday Night, the title of the New York Magazine article that inspired it. The film's title was ultimately shortened to Saturday Night, as a direct reference to the fact that Tony (John Travolta) and his friends inhabited 2001 Odyssey on Saturday nights. However, when The Bee Gees submitted the soundtrack, one of the songs, Night Fever, was thought to embody the film's spirit better than the original. Director John Badham added the word "Saturday" and it replaced the original title.
Another unimportant moment in history
Our final guest programmer of the season
Today in History:
December 16, 1773 -
The Boston Tea Party took place 248 years ago today.
I equally deplores the ecologically disastrous precedent set by these hotheaded young good-for-nothings, and their demeaning depiction of Native Americans as savage, tea-hating polluters. Also please do not confuse the Tea Party with Tea Baggers - two very different things although men wearing short skirts figure prominently in both of them.
December 16, 1950 -
President Harry S. Truman declares a state of emergency, after Chinese troops enter the fight with communist North Korea in the Korean War.
What the hell were we thinking?
December 16, 1965 -
NASA was in a piss-proud mood. Days before, Gemini 6 (Tom Stafford and Wally Schirra, space cowboys aboard) and Gemini 7 (Frank Borman and Jim Lovell, rocket men aboard) had successfully rendezvoused in space. Just before Tom Stafford and Wally Schirra were about to re-enter Earth's atmosphere, on this date, they radioed Mission Control with their startling sighting:
Wally and Tom do something even more startling; they break out in a chorus of Jingle Bells, accompanying themselves with a small harmonica and tiny small bells. The pair become the first men to perform Christmas carols from space. NASA, of course, was not amused having to pay the ASCAP fees.
December 16, 1985 -
What were you doing 37 years ago - I left work, cut through a parking garage in the middle of the block and walked passed the limos in front of Sparks Steak House on the next block on this date.
John and Paul are long gone but while I am still here. My old office, alas, is also long gone.
And so it goes
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