It's the unofficial last Sunday of Summer

August 31, 1929 -
RKO released the musical film-short St. Louis Blues, starring singer Bessie Smith, on this date.



At W.C. Handy's suggestion, Bessie Smith was picked to be the star of the film. Bessie had scored a huge hit in 1925 with her recording of St. Louis Blues, which had featured Louis Armstrong on cornet. This is the only known footage of Bessie in existence.


August 31, 1946 -
Warner Bros. introduced Foghorn Leghorn and the Barnyard Dawg, when the Merrie Melodies cartoon Walky Talky Hawky, (directed by Robert McKimson,) premiered on this date.



Foghorn Leghorn was closely based on Sen. Claghorn, a blustery, windbag Southern politician on radio's The Fred Allen Show -played by Allen's announcer Kenny Delmar - whose trademark lines included, "Somebody, Ah say, somebody knocked," "That's a joke, son," and "Pay attention, boy!".


August 31, 1966 -
A forgotten Blake Edward's comedy, What Did You Do in the War, Daddy?, written by William Peter Blatty and starring James Coburn and Dick Shawn, opened on this date.



Harry Morgan played Major Potts who becomes comically nonsensical in this movie. In the third season of the TV series MASH, he played essentially the same character as Major General Bartford Hamilton Steele. The episode was The General Flipped at Dawn, which first aired on September 10, 1974. When McLean Stevenson character Colonel Henry Blake, left the show at the end of the third season, the producers hired Morgan and created a new character, Colonel Potter. Interestingly, Potter is similar to the name of role he played here; Maj. Pott, sometimes referred to as Potty.


August 31, 1973 -
The Rolling Stones released their eleventh British (and thirteenth American) studio album Goats Head Soup, on this date.



The initial cover for the all was to have a goat peering out from a simmering pot, nodding to the album's Jamaican origins. (It was mostly recorded in Jamaica, where the soup, known as "mannish water," is a delicacy.) Mick Jagger has been quotes in saying,"The goat's head was my idea and it didn't really work out, the record company didn't like it, so we went with the more user-friendly portraits of the band in the end."


August 31, 1984 –
The sci-fi film C.H.U.D. (cannibalistic humanoid underground dwellers) directed by Douglas Cheek, and starring John Heard, Daniel Stern, and Christopher Curry, premiered on this date. An urban legend in 1985 suggested that this was based on a true story that happened in Cincinnati in the 1970s.



In 2011, as an April Fool's Day joke, the Criterion Collection, the USA's most prestigious distributor of home video, announced that it was releasing a special-edition DVD and Blu-ray Disc of the film with spine number 573. It was later assigned to The Music Room, but C.H.U.D. did receive a special edition Blu-ray release from Arrow Video in 2016.


August 31, 1985 -
Dire Straits' album, Brothers In Arms, started a nine-week run at No.1 on the US album charts on this date. The album also topped the charts in 25 other countries and went on to sell over 20 million worldwide.



The title of the album was inspired by the Falklands War, which was going on when Dire Straits lead singer Mark Knopfler wrote the song. The Falklands War was a conflict between Argentina and the UK over islands off the coast of Argentina that each country claimed rights to. The islands are British territories, but in 1982 Argentina tried to reclaim one of the islands. Britain reclaimed their territories, but lost 258 soldiers in the conflict.


August 31, 1987 -
Epic/CBS Records released the Michael Jackson album, BAD on this date.



Michael Jackson used the album to create a new image for himself, wearing leather and chains and acted tough. The title was hip with the times as well, as teenagers were using the word "bad" to mean "seriously cool." It was rebellious without being controversial, and it worked well for Jackson despite the ludicrous album cover. Barney Hoskyns may have written it best in his review of the album: "With his gossamer-delicate, surgically sculpted features, he looks like a beautiful Latin girl trapped inside an outfit from Mad Max II."



A nearly 18 minute video of the title song, written by novelist and screenwriter Richard Price and directed by Martin Scorsese, debuted on CBS-TV on this same day, as well.

Another book from the back shelves of The ACME Library.


Today in History -
Gaius Caesar Caligula was born on August 31 in the year 12 AD. Caligula succeeded Tiberius in the year 37, and his reign was most notable for its policy of Sex with the Emperor.



(Please note - this guy not only slept with the unwilling wives of senators and his sisters, he married his horse and tried to have him made a god.) This turned out to have been a weak Political Philosophy, because the Romans all had classical educations and saw right through him.



So they killed him.


August 31, 1422 -
Henry V of England, one of the great warrior kings of the Middle Ages, died suddenly of dysentery on this date. He was 34 at the time.

At the time of his death, Henry had not only consolidated power as the King of England but had also effectively accomplished what generations of his ancestors had failed to achieve through decades of war: the near unification of the crowns of England and France in a single person.



In 2002 he was ranked 72nd in the 100 Greatest Britons poll. And yet, lack of proper sanitary conditions carried him away.

Bunkies, listen to your ole pal, herr doktor - wash your hands after visiting the rest room.


August 31, 1879 -
Alma Maria Schindler, noted in her native Vienna for her beauty and intelligence, was born on this date.

In her youth she was an aspiring composer. But that's not why I bring her up.



She was the wife, successively, of the composer Gustav Mahler, architect Walter Gropius, and novelist Franz Werfel, and lover to the painter Oskar Kokoschka. Rather than try to encapsulate the story of this very busy woman,



Listen to Tom Lehrer's song Alma, which nicely gives you (if slantedly) the gist of her life.


August 31, 1887 -
The kinetoscope was patented by Thomas Edison (U.S. patent #589,168) on this date.

When his assistant W.K.L. Dickson invented the motion picture viewer, Edison initially considered it an insignificant toy. However, it turned out to be an immediate success.


August 31, 1910 -
The first U.S. airplane flight over water is made by Glenn Hammond Curtiss in his biplane over Lake Erie from Euclid Beach Park in Cleveland, Ohio, to Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio.

A crowd of 18,000 flocked to Euclid Beach to see his plane take off , and all across Cleveland people left their workplaces and headed outdoors to catch a glimpse of the amazing sight. The next day, flying back to Cleveland, he beat both the Lake Shore Limited train and homing pigeons, although it took longer than the first flight because he had to face strong winds. His return to Euclid Beach was greeted by 20,000 people.


August 31, 1919 -
Workers of the world unite!

In Chicago, journalist John Reed established the American Communist Labor Party, on this date,



providing entertainment for Joseph McCarthy and J. Edgar Hoover for decades.


August 31, 1920 -
John Lloyd Wright, son of famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright, was issued a patent for "Toy-Cabin Construction," which are known as Lincoln Logs. (U.S. patent 1,351,086)



Wright sold his rights to Playskool for $800, to supplement his meager salary, at the time. It is estimated that over 100 million sets of Lincoln Logs have been sold worldwide.


August 31, 1945 -
Let's all wish the intensely litigious and curmudgeonly, George Ivan Morrison, singer and songwriter, happy birthday.





Van the Man, is still the greatest living blue-eyed soul singer.


August 31, 1948 -
Los Angeles police arrested actor Robert Mitchum, the coolest cat in Hollywood, for marijuana possession on this date. He later received a 60-day sentence.



Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands celebrated her Golden Jubilee on this date as well. (You figure out the connection.)


August 31, 1950 -
A mouse flew on a US V-2 rocket from New Mexico, USA on on this date, reaching an altitude of 137 km (85 miles).

It was the first mouse in space. Unfortunately the rocket disintegrated because the parachute system failed.



But what the hell do you care.


August 31, 1955 -
The first solar-powered car, the 15 inch Sunmobile (designed by William G. Cobb,) was publicly demonstrated by General Motors Corporation, on this date. Light energy falling on twelve tiny selenium photoelectric cells created electric current sufficient to power the electric motor that turns a driveshaft connected to the car’s rear axle by a pulley.

It was one of the 253 exhibits at the General Motors Powerama in Chicago, Illinois, which will be seen by over 2,500,000 visitors during the course of the twenty-eight day, seven million dollar event spread over one million square feet on the shore of Lake Michigan.


August 31, 1957 -
The Lennon-McCartney comparison was frequently made and that was an image that critics could relate to. But it wasn't something people in the street could pick up on the way they'll pick up on someone who's really good-looking.



Glenn Tilbrook, singer, guitarist and with his writing partner Chris Difford, formed the pop group Squeeze, was born on this date.


August 31, 1976 -
George Harrison was found guilty of unintentionally plagiarizing My Sweet Lord from the Chiffons song He's So Fine.





Those damn Beatles could never come up with an original tune.


August 31, 1977 -
Ian Smith, espousing racial segregation, won the Rhodesian general election with 80% of overwhelmingly white electorate's vote.

>

Oops.


August 31, 1997 -
On August 28, 1997, Mrs. Dr. Caligari and I were coming out of the revolving doors at the Ritz Hotel in Paris and a very famous couple were coming in. A few days later on this date, a charming, slightly addled, beautiful divorcee with two children decides to take a car ride with her very rich Egyptian boyfriend and his very drunk driver. She makes the fatal mistake of not buckling her seat belt and paid a very heavy toll.



So ended the glamorous and controversial life of Diana Spencer Mountbatten-Windsor.

Bunkies here a good piece of advice for anyone, if you don't want to end up dying in the backseat of a black 1994 Mercedes-Benz W140 in a road tunnel in Paris - BUCKLE UP.



And so it goes

I'm really a marshmallow in my heart.

Today is National Toasted Marshmallow Day

It doesn't make any sense why this isn't celebrated on August 10th, National S'mores Day


August 30, 1935 (It could have been on the 29th, I don't know, I wasn't there.) -
RKO released the fourth Astaire and Rogers, Irving Berlin tune filled musical, Top Hat, in New York, on this date.



Fred Astaire supervised every other aspect of the development of a dance number from orchestration through final shooting and editing. He was particularly adamant about how a number should be filmed. He disliked interrupting the flow of the dance with unusual camera angles, cuts to the face or feet of the dancer, or reaction shots of people watching.


August 30, 1959 -
Bobby Darin's jazzy interpretation of Mack The Knife began its 26-week stay on the pop-singles charts.



The original German version of this song is called Theme from The Threepenny Opera, or Moritat, which is the German word for Murder Ballad. The lyrics have been translated in various ways on different versions, but the most popular translation was by the lyricist Marc Blitzstein for the 1954 off-Broadway revival of The Threepenny Opera, which ran until 1961 and played in Greenwich Village, New York.


August 30, 1965 -
Bob Dylan's sixth studio album, Highway 61 Revisited was released on this date. It was his first album to feature other rock musicians backing him on the album.



The Highway 61 Revisited album marks not only a milestone in Dylan's career, but a turbulent time for the culture surrounding him. Before releasing this album, Dylan played the notorious Newport Folk Festival, which is famous for all the wrong reasons (the crowd there was upset because Dylan was only going to play for 15 minutes), and afterwards was the Forest Hills concert, which is less-well known but had a much more turbulent crowd doing a lot more booing for reasons that weren't clear to anyone.


August 30, 1967 -
John Boorman's crime drama thriller, Point Blank, premiered on this date.



When James Sikking auditioned for the role of the assassin, John Boorman rejected him and told him that his face was too nice for a killer. For the next week, though, Boorman would look out his office window at MGM and see Sikking standing outside, partially concealed by a bush or a column, just watching him menacingly. The director eventually walked out and offered him the part.


August 30, 1968 -
Apple Records released its first single, Hey Jude by The Beatles on this date.



This was the Beatles longest single, running 7:11, and at the time was the longest song ever released as a single. It was the first long song to get a lot of airplay, as radio stations still preferred short ones so they could play more of them. When this became a hit, stations learned that listeners would stick around if they liked the song, which paved the way for long songs like American Pie and Layla. Disc jockeys were the real winners here, as they could finally take a reasonable bathroom break.


August 30, 1968 -
Columbia Records released the sixth studio album of The Byrds, Sweetheart of the Rodeo, on this date.



The first major album widely recognized as country rock, it represented a turning point for the 1970s country rock movement, which influenced the outlaw country and new traditionalist movements.


August 30, 1975 -
KC & The Sunshine Band's single Get Down Tonight reached No. 1 on the Billboard Charts (the first of five chart-toppers for the group,) on this date.



Written and produced by Harry Wayne (KC) Casey and his writing partner (and bass player) Richard Finch. Casey and Finch would sneak into nightclubs in the Miami area and get a taste of that culture, which influenced their sound. The song features a distinctive introduction, in which a recorded guitar solo is rendered at double speed over a normal-speed guitar line in the background. After observing someone else slowing down a tape machine, Richard Finch had the idea of using this technique to create the guitar riff, as a way of adding to the song something "that really keeps the buzz, that really keeps the excitement going all the way through without being too artificial sounding." Finch states that he was "always doing weird science" in those days, referring to his various experiments with sound.


August 30, 1986 -
Steve Winwood single, Higher Love went to No. 1 on the Billboard Charts on this date.



Winwood played many of the instruments on Back In The High Life and wrote the music for the songs, but for this and many other songs on the album, Will Jennings wrote the lyrics. Jennings is a very successful songwriter who also collaborated with Winwood on the albums Arc Of A Diver and Talking Back To The Night, and went on to write My Heart Will Go On with James Horner for the movie Titanic.


August 30, 1993 -
Moving himself and his gang of cohorts from NBC-TV, The Late Show with David Letterman premiered on CBS-TV, on this date.



NBC claimed "intellectual property rights" on many of Letterman's famous running gags and characters from his original show. As a result, the character of Larry Bud Melman was retired (though the actor remained with the show and appeared under his real name), and such traditions as "Viewer Mail", "Stupid Pet Tricks", and the "Top 10 List" were simply renamed. This controversy was the subject of much ridicule during the 1993-94 TV season, mostly from Letterman himself.


August 30, 2018 -
Yorgos Lanthimos' black comedy The Favourite, starring Olivia Coleman, Rachel Weisz, and Emma Stone premieres at the Venice Film Festival on this date.



All of the actors rehearsed together for three weeks. They played a variety of improvisation games, worked with a choreographer, and were given free rein to look foolish in front of each other, so there would be no inhibitions on set.

Don't forget to tune in to The ACME Eagle Hand Soap Radio Hour in history


Today in History:
August 30, 1780 -
General "Eggs" Benedict Arnold secretly puts into motion a plot to surrender the West Point fort to the British army during the American Revolution. The measure of Arnold's treachery was made worse by the fact that he was considered by many to be the best general and most accomplished leader in the Continental Army.



In fact, without Arnold's earlier contributions to the American cause, the American Revolution might well have been lost; notwithstanding, his name, like those of several other prominent traitors throughout history, has become a byword for treason and a brunch staple.


August 30, 1859 -
At the University of Göttingen, PhD candidate Albert Niemann isolates the alkaloid C17H21NO4 from leaves of the plant Erythroxylum coca.

Niemann names his white, powdery discovery Cocaine and observes firsthand its peculiarly strong anesthetic effect: "it benumbs the nerves of the tongue, depriving it of feeling and taste."



Oh, that's what cocaine does. Now I know.


August 30, 1918 -
Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin should have been having a great day on this date. Six weeks earlier, Lenin had the previous tenant of Kremlin, Tsar Nicholas II, permanently taken off the lease. After speaking at a factory in Moscow, Lenin was shot twice by Fanya Kaplan, a member of the Social Revolutionary party. Lenin narrowly survived an assassination attempt, but was severely wounded.



As Lenin was a 'godless' communist, he did not turn the other cheek. The assassination attempt set off a wave of reprisals by the Bolsheviks against the Social Revolutionaries and other political opponents. Thousands were executed as Russia fell deeper into civil war.


August 30, 1930 -
Warren Edward Buffett often called the "Sage of Omaha", "Oracle of Omaha", or "Omaha Steak", American investor, businessperson and philanthropist is born on this date. Buffett has amassed an enormous fortune from astute investments managed through the holding company Berkshire Hathaway, of which he is the largest shareholder and CEO.



With an estimated current net worth of around $154 billion (please note, these figures are from earlier this year - and his wealth appears to have continued climbing), he was ranked by Forbes as the sixth-richest person in the world as of this past March. He fell behind Elon Musk (net worth: $424.5 billion, nearly doubling his fortune from last year), Mark Zuckerberg, who leapt into second place (net worth: $216 billion), Jeff Bezos (net worth: $215 billion), Larry Ellison (net worth: $192 billion), and Bernard Arnault, who slipped to fifth place (net worth: $178 billion, including his family’s wealth).

I, on the other hand, did not make a blip on the list.


August 30, 1963 -
Almost a year after the world barely averted World War III during the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Hotline between the Pentagon and the Kremlin went live, on this date.



The system consists of two teletype machines, with a full-time communications link routed through London, Copenhagen, Stockholm, and Helsinki.


August 30, 1967 -
Thurgood Marshall, the lawyer who was best known for arguing the Brown v. Board of Education case before the Supreme Court, became the first black US Supreme Court Justice.



The US Senate voted 69 to 11 to appoint Marshall (20 senators did not vote.) He served on the Court from 1967 to 1991.


August 30, 1983 -
The first black astronaut, Guion S. Bluford Jr., a US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel, flew on the third mission of the Space Shuttle Challenger.



Bluford had entered the US Astronaut program in 1979; this was his first mission. This was also the first mission to launch and land at night.


August 30, 1984 -
Originally scheduled to lift off in June, Discovery (STS-41-D), the twelfth space shuttle mission, launched on this date. The Discovery carried six crew members to space: Commander Henry Hartsfield, Pilot Michael Coats, Mission Specialists Judith Resnick, Steven Hawley, Richard Mullane and Payload Specialist Charles Walker.



During the mission, three communications satellites were deployed. The shuttle safely completed it's mission on September 5, 1984.



And so it goes

I like those fellows

August 29, 1953 -

Warner Brothers introduced Speedy Gonzalez in the cartoon Cat-Tails for Two on this date.



While this is the first cartoon featuring the character Speedy Gonzales, his depiction here is vastly different from the character he would later become. It wasn't until his second appearance, Speedy Gonzales (two years later,) that he was re-designed as the character we know him as today.


August 29, 1962 -
The United Artists remake of the 1937 boxing film, Kid Galahad, this time starring Elvis and co-starring Lola Albright, Gig Young, Charles Bronson, and Ed Asner (in his first screen appearance,) went into general release on this date.



Dolores Fuller who wrote the song I Got Lucky for Elvis had been the girlfriend of Edward D. Wood Jr. a decade earlier and had acted in several of his productions. She wrote songs for several Elvis movies.


August 29, 1964 -
Roy Orbison’s single, (Oh,) Pretty Woman, was released on this date.



Roy Orbison was writing with his songwriting partner Bill Dees at his house when he told Dees to get started writing by playing anything that came to mind. Orbison's wife Claudette came in and said she was going to go into town to buy something. Orbison asked if she needed any money, and Dees cracked, "Pretty woman never needs any money."


August 29, 1964 -
Walt Disney’s Mary Poppins opened in general release on this date. This is first movie I ever saw (but not on this date.)





Walt Disney cast Julie Andrews for the lead after seeing her in Camelot on Broadway. When she mentioned she was pregnant, he offered to wait until she had her baby to start filming and offered her then-husband, Tony Walton, the job of designing costumes and some sets for this movie. Disney also gave the couple a personally escorted tour of Disneyland and the studio to help them make up their minds. Disney liked Andrews in Camelot so much that after he saw her performance he had the animators of One Hundred and One Dalmatians draw the character of Anita to resemble her.


August 29, 1967 -
ABC's television ratings soared through the roof as David Janssen and Barry Morse starred in the final episode of The Fugitive on this date.



This was the first series to feature a "final episode" in which all the plot lines were resolved, and all questions answered.


August 29, 1981 -
ELO's album, Time, went to No. 1 on the U.K. charts on this date. It was their second album to do so.



There is a backward message on the Time album. Actually, it's on the interlude between Twilight and Yours Truly, 2095, but on the Time CD it's attached to Twilight from [3:22] to [3:36]. It's simply a backwards run verse from 21st Century Man: "Though you ride on the wheels of tomorrow, you still wander the fields of your sorrow". This trick is repeated at the end of 21st Century Man, just before Hold On Tight.


August 29, 1986 -
BBC1-TV aired a Paul McCartney special, McCartney for the first time, on this date.



Originally conceived as a long-form promotional piece for the Wings album, Press to Play, the BBC staffer (Richard Skinner) persuades Paul McCartney to talk about much more, including one of the more in-depth interviews about Wings.


August 29, 1986 -
George Harrison's production company, HandMade Films' romantic comedy, Shanghai Surprise, starring newlyweds Madonna and Sean Penn, was released on this date.



Apparently, after principal photography wrapped, executive producer George Harrison allegedly said of the movie's two lead stars Madonna and Sean Penn: "Penn is a pain in the ass . . . [while] she has to realize that you can be a fabulous person and be humble as well".


August 29, 1994 –
The battling Gallagher Brothers, Liam and Noel, released their debut album Definitely Maybe, as Oasis, on this date.



Noel Gallagher started writing the song Live Forever, (which went on to become once of the bands most popular songs,) when he was a roadie for The Inspiral Carpets. It helped convince his brother Liam to let him join his band, Oasis.


Another unimportant moment in history


Today in History:
August 29, 29/30AD (The date is a best guess, and the subject of much debate. Once again, Romans were too busy with their orgies and draining lead-lined wine goblets to accurately document events of the day.)

John the Baptist (cousin of the itinerant carpenter of Nazareth) received a severe haircut from King Herod, because his teenage step-daughter, Salome (the Miley Cyrus of her day,) couldn't keep her shorts on while dancing.



Children are always such a handful.


August 29, 1533 -
Atahualpa, the last Incan Emperor, discovered on this date, that the European exploration of the new world was not going to go well for the indigenous people. Francisco Pizarro, one in a long line of Spanish conquistadors arrived in the Andes, with a bible in one hand and a sword in the other. Atahualpa was quickly captured by the Spanish and held for ransom. After paying an immense ransom for his release (a room, 22 ft by 17 ft by 8 ft high, once filled with gold and twice with silver within two months), Pizarro decided it was better to kill his hostage and keep the random.



Atahualpa was condemned to be burnt at the stake - which was anathematic since the Inca believed that the soul would not be able to go on to the afterlife if the body were burned. Atahualpa offered and paid an additional random to be ritualistically garroted after a proper Christian baptism, which occurred on this date in 1533, (several sites place his death on July 26, 1533 and his burial was on this date, but dead is dead.)


More on Political Philosophy ...
Jean Baptiste Colbert was born on August 29, 1619.

Colbert was the finance minister to King Louis XIV of France. His own Political Philosophy consisted of a big pile of money. This was a very effective politics, and therefore deemed insufficiently philosophical, which is why you tend to hear more about Locke and Hegel.

Another important political philosopher was born this week: John Locke was born on August 29, 1632. Mr. Locke was a political philosopher, and many of his ideas found their way into the American Constitution.



He is best known for his essay concerning human understanding, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, which remains famous to this day as the shortest essay ever written.


August 29, 1896 -
Here is one of those bright dividing lines: if you know what Chop Suey is - you're old. If you've tasted Chop Suey - you're really old.



The Chinese-American dish Chop Suey was invented in New York City by the chef to visiting Chinese Ambassador Li Hung-chang on this date.


August 29, 1915 -
Ingrid Bergman, the Swedish three-time Academy Award, two-time Emmy Award, and Tony Award - winner was born (and died in 1982) on this date.



Many of her shorter male co-stars, such as Humphrey Bogart and Claude Rains, had to wear lifts to avoid looking small next to her 5' 10" stature.


August 29, 1920 -
Charles Christopher "Bird" Parker, jazz saxophonist and composer was born on this date.



Along with trumpet legend Dizzy Gillespie, he created the sporadic rhythms known as "be bop" in the 1950s.


August 29, 1949 -
The Soviet Union joined the nuclear club on this date when they detonated a nuclear weapon, code-named First Lightning (Pervaya Molniya) at a test site in Kazakhstan. American experts were shocked and dismayed because they had thought the Soviets were still years away from having a workable bomb.



The resultant fear helped trigger an arms race that would see the Americans and Soviets stockpile approximately 32,000 and 45,000 nuclear devices.


August 29, 1958 -
Michael Joseph Jackson, the self-crowned King of Pop was born on this date.



He has achieved the dubious distinction of being in the number one position on Forbes magazine's list of "Top-Earning Dead Celebrities", six years in a row.

Last year was not bad for the King of Pop's income, Jackson's posthumous earnings were $115 million dollars. His large wealth is partly due to the Broadway musical MJ: The Musical, which brought in $85 million in the past 12 months. Elvis Presley, Jackson's former father-in-law, was the second biggest earner on the list, earning $100 million.


August 29, 1966 -
The Beatles performed their last concert before paying fans at in San Francisco's Candlestick Park on this date.



The performance marked the end of a four-year period dominated by touring and concerts including nearly 60 U.S. appearances and over 1400 internationally.


August 29, 1991 -
After a vote in the Soviet Union's parliament, the Supreme Soviet dissolved the Communist Party of the Soviet Union on this date.

The move brought an end to one of the world's largest communist governments.


August 29, 2005 -
Hurricane Katrina devastated much of the U.S. Gulf Coast from Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle. The death toll eventually reached at least 1,600. An estimated 300 Louisiana residents died out of state; some 230 people perished in Mississippi. Property damage estimates were in the hundreds of billions of dollars.



The name Katrina was officially retired on April 6, 2006 by the World Meteorological Organization at the request of the U.S. government. The name will never again be used for another North Atlantic hurricane.


Before your go - As always -

Bunkies, be careful out there.



And so it goes

You've left out a Hungerdunger. You left out the main one, too.

August 28, 1930 -
... I'm sick of these conventional marriages. One woman and one man was good enough for your grandmother, but who wants to marry your grandmother? Nobody, not even your grandfather. Think! Think of the honeymoon! Strictly private. I wouldn't let another woman in on this. Well, maybe one or two. But, no men! I may not go myself ...

The Marx Brothers second outing at Paramount, Animal Crackers, opened on this date.



In 1957, Paramount forgot to renew the soundtrack rights which reverted back to the authors of the play. (The studio did renew the picture rights, though.) As a result, the film could not legally be seen in the USA until 1974, when Universal, which had since purchased Paramount's film library, was persuaded by fan requests to re-release it.


August 28, 1946 -
Universal's film-noir classic version of Ernest Hemingway's story, The Killers, premiered in NYC on this date.



After leaving Warner Brothers for Universal with The Killers, producer Mark Hellinger initially wanted to borrow Warners director Don Siegel, but the loanout fee proved prohibitively high for a director of his limited reputation at that time, so Hellinger used Universal's Robert Siodmak. Ironically, almost 20 years later Siegel did go on to direct the remake, The Killers.


August 28, 1951 -
Paramount's second film version based on Theodore Dreiser's novel, An American Tragedy, A Place in the Sun, opened in NYC on this date.



Although this movie was released in 1951, it was shot in 1949. Paramount Pictures already had released its blockbuster Sunset Blvd. when this movie wrapped. The studio did not want what was sure to be another blockbuster in this movie competing for Oscars with Sunset Blvd., so it waited until 1951 to release this movie. This actually pleased producer and director George Stevens, as he would use the extra time to edit this movie.


August 28, 1968 -
Simon & Garfunkel's fourth studio album, Bookends, went to No. 1 on the U.K. Billboard charts on this date.



At the 1969 Grammy ceremony, Simon & Garfunkel won the Record of the Year and Best Contemporary-Pop Performance by a Vocal Duo or Group awards for Mrs. Robinson.


August 28, 1978 -
The pilot episode for the short lived series Flying High, (think The Love Boat in the sky,) starring Kathryn Witt, Connie Sellecca, Pat Klous, and Howard Platt premiered on this date.



Flying High was canceled after 15 epsiodes -the final three episodes never had a chance to air.


August 28, 1978 -
Released by Warner Bros. and produced by Brian Eno, Devo's debut album , Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo was released, on this date.



The album was met with mixed reviews at the time, but today is viewed as one of the most significant albums of the Post-Punk and New Wave genres. In fact, a number of musical luminaries were interested in producing the band's debut, including Iggy Pop and even David Bowie (who at the time described them as "the band of the future").


August 28, 1998 -
Pearl Jam's video for the song Do The Evolution, premiered on MTV on this date.



The video, which is animated by Todd McFarlane, was the first video Pearl Jam released since their Jeremy clip in 1992. The band felt that videos detracted from the music, but also hated the process of making them. Since they didn't appear in this video, it was much easier for them


August 28, 1998 -
The Warner Bros. Frankie Lymon biopic Why Do Fools Fall In Love starring Larenz Tate, Halle Berry and Vivica A. Fox premiered on this date in US theatres.



When Tina Andrews wrote the original script, the part of Frankie Lymon was first offered to Michael Jackson.


August 28, 2001 -
Weezer released Island in the Sun, the second single from Weezer (aka The Green Album) on this date.



This is the most-licensed track in the Weezer catalog. Frontman Rivers Cuomo told Billboard magazine: "The funny thing is, the song wasn't a real radio hit. I can only speculate that it's because the song has a cleaner guitar sound, which makes it easier for a more mainstream audience."


Another ACME Safety Film.


Today in History:
August 28, 476 A.D. -
Today is believed to be the date when the Western Roman Empire, which had lasted for almost 500 years, came to an end as Emperor Romulus Augustulus was deposed by a barbarian. (Well, his father, Orestes, the real power behind the throne, was executed on this date - he, Augustulus, relinquished the throne on September 4, 476 and disappeared into obscurity.)

Historians have been theorizing about the causes of the fall of Rome ever since. Edward Gibbon's book The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776) put forward the idea that the Christian Church was to blame. After Christianity became the official religion of the empire, the best and the brightest leaders became leaders of the church rather than leaders of the government or the military. Another theory is that the aqueducts, which carried the water supply, were lined with lead, and so the Romans slowly went crazy. Some geologists believe that the eruption of Mount Vesuvius released so much ash into the air that it ruined Roman agriculture and weakened the empire. One of the more recent theories is that the Roman army had been infiltrated by the barbarians themselves.



But whatever the cause, the fall of Rome actually wasn't the catastrophic event most people think it was. So-called barbarian rulers kept most of the basic laws in place, Latin remained the official language of government, everyone remained Christian and orgies continued but in private.


August 28, 1837 -
Pharmacists John Lea and William Perrins began commercially manufacturing Worcestershire Sauce on this date, based on an Indian recipe brought to them by Lord Marcus Sandys -- an ex-governor of Bengal.



If they told you the recipe (it contains anchovies), they'd have to kill you.


August 28, 1845 -
Scientific American, founded by Rufus M. Porter, was published for the first time as a four-page weekly newspaper, on this date.

It is the oldest continuously published monthly magazine in the United States.


August 28, 1883 -
The first controlled flight in a "Gull" glider was made by John J. Montgomery at Wheeler Hill, California.



The craft weight 38 pounds and sailed a distance of 603 feet at an altitude of about fifteen feet at Otay Mesa near San Diego, Ca.


August 28, 1898 -
Pharmacist Caleb Davis Bradham created a beverage, he believed would aid in digestion and boost energy, calling it "Brad's Drink," on this date.



He later renamed it Pepsi-Cola, after "pepsin" and the kola nut used to flavor the drink.

And unfortunately, made with no cocaine.


August 28, 1907 -
Two teenagers, Jim Casey and Claude Ryan decide to start the American Messenger Company in Seattle, on this date. The company's name was later changed to the United Parcel Service.

Hopefully you have those tracking numbers available, some of those packages will arrive soon.


August 28, 1922 -
The first radio commercial aired on WEAF in New York City (WEAF stood for Water, Earth, Air and Fire.)

It was a 10-minute advertisement for the Queensboro Realty Co., which had paid $100.  Programming must have really stunk if people listened to a 10 minute commercial.


August 28, 1938 -
Charlie McCarthy (Edgar Bergen’s wooden partner ) received the first degree given to a ventriloquist’s dummy on this date.

The honorary degree, “Master of Innuendo and Snappy Comeback,” was presented on radio by Ralph Dennis, the dean of the School of Speech at Northwestern University. I wrote my dissertation on, "The illusionary construct of time - it really is 5pm somewhere in the world." And I earned my degree without someone's hand up my ass.


August 28, 1955 –
A 14-year-old  black teenager from Chicago, Emmett Till was brutally murdered in Mississippi, for ‘flirting’ with a white woman, Carolyn Bryant. Eyewitnesses linked Carolyn’s husband Roy Bryant and half-brother J.W. Milam to the murder. Bryant and Milam were indicted soon thereafter. Both were acquitted by an all-white jury. Bryant and Milan later confessed to the killing in a magazine interview.



Before her death in 2017, Carolyn Bryant admitted she lied when she testified in 1955 that Emmett Till touched her.


August 28, 1963 -
During a 200,000-person civil rights rally in at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his famous "I have a dream" speech," 61 years ago today.



The speech, from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, was a defining moment of the American Civil Rights Movement.



Marian Anderson, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Peter, Paul & Mary and other performer lent their voices to the proceeding that day as well.


August 28, 1964 -
The Beatles met Bob Dylan for the first time at The Delmonico Hotel, following their show at New York’s Forest Hills Stadium, on this date.



After being introduced by a mutual friend, writer Al Aronowitz, the band offered their guests drinks, but Dylan and Aronowitz expressed interest in smoking weed instead. This marked the Fab Four’s first taste of marijuana – an experience that would prove to be transformative in their career.


August 28, 1982 -
Two young people got married on this date.

Happy Anniversary Mary.


August 28, 1996 -
Unfortunately for others, the fairy tale has a very unhappy ending,

Britons Charles, Prince of Wales, and Diana, Princess of Wales, were divorced on this date.

One year later, almost to the day, Diana would have a very nasty accident in a Paris underpass.



And so it goes

An important announcement from this Mutual Broadcasting Network

Most American children learned from an early age to look both ways before crossing the street, but how many of them really know how to protect themselves against political assassination?

Not many. And yet, each year, millions of people are killed by assassins.

It’s tragic because these are needless deaths, almost all of which could have been prevented. ACME would like to mention a few simple precautions can help ensure that no assassin’s bullet will ever have your name on it:

A) First, get plenty of exercise, eat plenty of vegetables, and avoid being born into royalty.
B) Don’t be president, prime minister, or other Top Person.
C) Don’t create a military junta or mastermind a coup.
D) Don’t say or write anything that might be considered disparaging by anyone with their own military junta.
E) Do not found a religion.
F) Do not oppose a religion.
G) If your parents are gods, dismember them.
H) If your children are gods, devour them.
I) Excel at nothing.
J) Stay indoors.
K) Always call shotgun when driving with suicide car-bombers.



The more you know


La Tomatina tomato fight in Buñol near Valencia happens every year on the last Wednesday in August though the partying starts earlier in the week. The highlight of the festival is the tomato fight which takes place between 11am and 1pm on that day. Thousands upon thousands of people make their way from all corners of the world to fight in this World's Biggest Food Fight.



There is no political or religious significance to La Tomatina, it's just good, messy fun. The tradition’s beginning remains a mystery but this event is estimated to have begun in 1945. The event has become one of the highlights on Spain’s summer festivals calendar with thousands of people flocking to this little Valencian town for this chaotic event.


Today is the feast day of St. Monica of Hippo.

The more you know
Monica, who was originally from Honey Badger Bluff and moved to the better neighborhood of Hippo, was known as a virtuous woman. Much to her disappointment, she was also the mother of St. Augustine. She continually encouraged (nagged) her son (the lazy bum) about his debauched ways until she successfully convinced him to convert.

She is the patron saint of all mothers with disappointing children.


August 27, 1935 -
RKO Pictures released the film She, directed by Lansing C. Holden and Irving Pichel and starring Helen Gahagan, Randolph Scott, Helen Mack, and Nigel Bruce in the US, on this date.



For many years this film version was considered lost. This film exists at the present time because Buster Keaton had a copy of the original print stored in his garage, which he gave to film historian Raymond Rohauer for preservation.


August 27, 1943 -
(An almost forgotten film) Warner Bros. released the Lillian Hellman anti-fascist drama, Watch On The Rhine, starring Bette Davis, Paul Lukas, Geraldine Fitzgerald and Beulah Bondi, on this date.



This adaptation of Lillian Hellman's play was written by her longtime companion, Dashiell Hammett. Hellman was unable to write the adaptation herself as she was contracted to work on the screenplay for The North Star. She recommended that Hammett be given the assignment as he was very familiar with the material. (Hammett also needed the money.)


August 27, 1947 -
20th Century Fox's classic film-noir, crime-drama, Kiss of Death, directed by Henry Hathaway, and starring Victor Mature, Brian Donlevy, Coleen Gray, and Richard Widmark, premiered on this date.



When New York mobster Joe Gallo--a vicious killer known as "Crazy Joe"--was starting out as a small-time hoodlum, he saw this movie and instantly idolized Tommy Udo (Richard Widmark). Afterwards, Gallo began wearing his suits with black shirts and white ties in emulation of Udo. He also began acting in a more crazed manner, thus giving rise to his "Crazy Joe" persona, which lasted until the gangster's death in April of 1972, when he was murdered by rival gangsters in Umberto's Clam House in Little Italy.


August 27, 1953 -
William Wyler, romantic comedy, Roman Holiday, starring Audrey Hepburn, Gregory Peck, and Eddie Arnold, premiered in NYC on this date.



Paramount originally wanted to shoot this movie in Hollywood. William Wyler refused, insisting it must be shot on location. They finally agreed, but with a much lower budget. This meant the movie would be in black and white, not the expected Technicolor, and he would need to cast an unknown actress as the Princess, Audrey Hepburn.


August 27, 1966 -
The Beach Boys' single, God Only Knows peaked at No.2 on the UK singles chart. Surprisingly, it only managed to scrape the Top 40 in the United States. That's because it was released as a B-side, partly because of fear that radio stations would refuse to play a song with "God" in the title.







The song broke new ground in many ways. It was one of the first commercial songs to use the word 'God' in its title and Brian Wilson used many unorthodox instruments, including the French horns that are heard in the song's famous introduction.


August 27, 1969 –
An early Francis Ford Coppola film, The Rain People, starring Shirley Knight, James Caan and Robert Duvall premiered on this date.



George Lucas visited the set while finishing film school, having heard that Francis Ford Coppola, a fellow film school graduate, was directing. The two struck up a fast friendship and became frequent collaborators during the 1970s, and again in the 1980s with Tucker: The Man and His Dream.


August 27, 1970 -
The sci-fi musical (no one has ever seen,) Toomorrow, directed by Val Guest, starring newcomer Olivia Newton-John as a pop singer whose band gets abducted by aliens, premiered on this date.



Producer Harry Saltzman hired David Benedictus to write the screenplay, but Saltzman was unhappy with the way it was developing, so he instructed director Val Guest to pen his own script, assuring him that he'd deal with Benedictus. It wasn't until Guest's version was finished that Benedictus caught wind of the situation, at which point he sent Guest an angry letter.


August 27, 1991 -
Epic Records released Pearl Jam' s debut studio album, Ten, on this date.



Up until they were recording the album, Pearl Jam was known as Mookie Blaylock, as in the professional basketball player. Since calling themselves Mookie Blaylock would have possibly led to legal problems, they decided to just pay tribute to the point guard by calling their debut album Ten, his jersey number.


August 27, 2004 -
After 1,190 episodes, Craig Kilborn called it quits as the host of The Late Late Show on CBS TV, on this date.



The Scottish-born American comedian Craig Ferguson took over the show on January 3, 2005.


August 27, 2004 -
Hong Kong martial arts film Hero starring Jet Li, Tony Leung, Maggie Cheung, Zhang Ziyi, Donnie Yen and Chen Daoming, opened in the US on this date, and became the first Chinese-language film to reach #1 at US box office.



The "red fight" between Moon and Flying-Snow was filmed in a forest in Mongolia. Director Yimou Zhang had to wait until the leaves turn yellow, and hired local nomads to gather even more yellow leaves in order to cover the ground completely. In fact, he was so fanatic about the leaves, that he had his crew separate the leaves into four different "classes" which were each put at increasingly farther lengths from the camera.


Another episode from ACME's Little Known Animal Facts


Today in History:
August 27, 413 BC -
A lunar eclipse interrupted a lovely evening of fraternizing among the sailors of the Athens fleet on this evening, affecting the outcome of a battle in the Peloponnesian War. The Athenians were ready to move their forces from Syracuse when the Moon was eclipsed. The soldiers and sailors were startled by this celestial omen and tenaciously clung to their nude and well-oiled ship mates.



The fleet’s commander, Nicias, gutted a sheep and postpones the fleet’s departure for 27 days. The delay gave an advantage to their enemies, the Syracusans, who went on to defeat the entire Athenian fleet and army, killing Nicias in the process.


August 27, 410 -
In case you were keeping score, the Sack of Rome still continued unabated. The orgies were winding down: lubricants were in short supply and everything that moved had been used. The Visigoths were forced to engage in unnatural acts with statuary.

For those of you with a more genteel nature, I won't tell you how the statuary was used.


Political Philosophy has caused more human death and suffering than any other disease. No inoculations exist. Outbreaks are sudden and almost always fatal. Political Philosophy strikes young and old alike, healthy and sickly, nimble and clumsy, lefty and righty. By the time its symptoms are visible, you have very little time to protect yourself. Popular referendums will only exacerbate the problem.

Emigrate at once.

Case studies: On August 27, 1793, the Committee of Public Safety in Paris, France, accepted its newest member, Maximilien Robespierre.

Robespierre soon rose to prominence on the basis of his Political Philosophy, the Guillotine, which was quicker than Inalienable Rights and more readily understood than Separation of Powers.

On August 27, 1770, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was born on this date. Georg's family was so poor that they couldn't afford the second 'e' in his first name. Hegel was also a kind of political philosopher.

He believed in theses and antitheses and that sooner or later everyone ended up in Synthetics. Unfortunately there was no way to test his theory, as this was well before the invention of polyester.


August 27, 1882 -
Schmuel Gelbfisz, (Samuel Goldwyn), glove maker, sales man and pioneer filmmaker was born in Warsaw, Poland on this date.



His sayings, sometimes known as "Goldwynisms," were famous for their unintentional wit, which was partially as a result of his somewhat limited understanding of the English language that surfaced when he tried to comment on certain situations. There are many examples of this, such as "Include me out" or "a verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on."


August 27, 1896 –
The Shortest War in recorded history was the Anglo-Zanzibar War. The conflict lasted between 38 and 45 minutes.



Spoiler alert:



Zanzibar lost.


August 27, 1916 -
Martha Raye, singer, actor, denture wearer was born in Butte, Montana, on this date.



Martha Raye had a lifelong fear of flying, but because of her profession was required to make numerous air trips, which she could muster only after drinking herself into a near alcoholic stupor. Her drinking and conduct during these periods ended up with a number of airlines refusing her service, particularly on her many trips into the Miami, Florida, area, which was a favored vacation spot.


August 27, 1928 -
60 nations agree to sign the Kellogg-Briand Pact on this date. Its signatories renounce aggressive war, and war as an instrument of national policy, but no sanctions are provided for violations.



Most of the diplomats were too embarrassed to admit they thought they thought they were there to taste-test a new breakfast cereal.


August 27, 1952 -
Paul Reubens (Pee-wee Herman) actor, writer, comedian and public onanist was born on this date.



Reubens credits pioneer TV children's show host Pinky Lee as a partial inspiration for his "Pee-Wee Herman" character. Like Reubens, Lee also wore a tight checked suit and hat as part of his characterization.


August 27, 1955 -
In 1954, two brothers, Norris and Ross McWhirter, who ran a London fact-finding agency were tapped by Sir Hugh Beaver, the managing director of the Guinness Brewery, to create a book to settle bar bets (generate great buzz for the brewery.) Their work - The Guinness Book of World Records was first published on this date.



Guinness World Records has the distinction of being “The best-selling annual publication” in history, with “132,002,542 copies sold from 1955 until October 2013.”


August 27, 1965 –
A small house party occurred at 525 Perugia Way in Bel Air, California, on this date, one that few knew about while it was taking place: the meeting between the four Beatles and Elvis Presley, in Elvis’s home.



The Beatles visit lasted 4 hours during which time they told stories, joked and listened to records. The five of them even had an impromptu jam session – at the time no one thought to record the historical event.


August 27, 1967 -
Brian Epstein, the man who discovered the Beatles and guided them to mega-stardom, died at his London residence, from an overdose of sleeping pills, on this date.



Many critics believe this traumatic event ultimately lead to the Beatles breakup.


August 27, 1979 -
Lord Louis Mountbatten, the last viceroy of India (and matchmaker of his second cousin, the Queen of England to his nephew, our favorite itinerant Greek sailor, the late Philip Mountbatten,) was killed, along with his grandson, off the coast of Ireland in his 29-foot sail boat in Sligo, Ireland; the Irish Republican Army claimed responsibility.



Thomas McMahon was the bombmaker and was jailed at Dublin’s Mountjoy prison. He was released in 1998 as part of the Northern Ireland peace agreement.



And so it goes.