The day should encourage one to look within to not only set personal goals, but also to choose goals that benefit one's community.
Today is the Sixth Day of Christmas. Today's gift count (56 gifts): you currently have Six geese a' laying, 10 golden rings, 12 calling birds, 12 French hens, ten turtledoves and six partridges in their respective pear trees (begin thinking abut gardening tools and hiring an illegal immigrant.)
You may not know this but, geese are filthy disgusting birds - contact your local upscale poultry purveyor. Geese lay approximately one egg every 1.5 days.
December 30, 1939 -
Lewis Milestone's adaptation of the John Steinbeck novella Of Mice and Men, starring Burgess Meredith, Betty Field, and Lon Chaney Jr., premiered in the US on this date.
Lon Chaney Jr. had played the role of Lennie in the Los Angeles stage production of Of Mice and Men, and asked director Lewis Milestone for a screen test. Milestone was planning on casting Broderick Crawford in the role, but agreed to let Chaney feed lines to actresses testing for the part of Mae. By the end of all the tests, Milestone had changed his mind, and cast Chaney in the part without a test of his own.
December 30, 1942 -
Frank Sinatra opened at New York's Paramount Theatre for what was scheduled to be a 4-week engagement (his shows turned out to be so popular, he was booked for an additional 4 weeks). An estimated 400 policemen were called out to help curb the excitement.
It is said that some of the teen-age girls were hired to scream, but many more screamed for free. Sinatra was dubbed 'The Sultan of Swoon,' 'The Voice that Thrills Millions' and just 'The Voice.' Whatever he was known as, it was at this Paramount Theatre engagement that modern pop hysteria was born .
December 30, 1949 -
Stanley Donen/ Gene Kelly's wonderful take on the Comden and Green musical, On the Town, starring Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra, opened nationwide on this date.
When On the Town premiered at Radio City Music Hall, the line to get in was the largest in that theater's history.
December 30, 1951 –
The Roy Rogers TV Show, surprisingly starring Roy Rogers, Dave Evans, Trigger, the Golden Palomino, and Bullet, the Wonder Dog premiered on NBC-TV, on this date.
The phrase "Whoa Nelly!" originated with Pat Brady. Nelly was short for Nellybelle, the name of his cantankerous Jeep. He used the phrase in nearly every show while racing after the villains or rushing for help. "Nellybelle," was actually Roy Rogers' personal vehicle.
December 30, 1965 -
Unbelievably but The Kinks, The Who, Manfred Mann, The Hollies and Gerry and the Pacemakers all appeared on the episode of Shindig!, on this date.
The show was canceled in 1966, after experimenting unsuccessfully with more mainstream musical guests
December 30, 1970 -
Paul McCartney sued the other three Beatles to dissolve the partnership and gain control of his interest. The suit touched off a bitter feud between McCartney and the others, especially his co-writer on many of the Beatles compositions, John Lennon.
The Beatles were legally disbanded, four years to the day after Paul McCartney sued his band mates to dissolve the partnership.
December 30, 1980 -
The longest-running series in prime-time television history (at the time,) The Wonderful World of Disney, was canceled on NBC after more than 25 years on the air. The Government, wanting to honor this momentous occasion, had the Selective Service System send a warning to Mickey Mouse at Disneyland in Anaheim, California. The Selective Service said that Mickey was in violation of registration compliance.
ACME Remembers
Today in History:
December 30, 1852 -
Future US President Rutherford B. Hayes married Lucy Webb on this date, at the house of Lucy's mother. The wedding was performed by Dr. L.D. McCabe of Delaware.
But what the hell do you care.
December 30, 1853 -
Kids, follow along, it gets bumpy.
The matter about the money was to be very contentious: even though the agreement specified $10 million, the US Congress agreed on only $7 million ($183 million in 2010 dollars). When the money finally arrived in Mexico City $1 million ($26.07 million in 2010 dollars) was missing, thus resulting in a total of only $6 million (oh, you do the math.) The treaty included a provision allowing the U.S. to build a transoceanic canal across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, though this option was never exercised. With a few exceptions, such as the resolution of the Chamizal dispute, acquisition of land in this purchase defined the present boundaries of the continental United States.
December 30, 1862 -
The Union ironclad ship the USS Monitor sank off Cape Hatteras, N.C., during a storm on this date.
While the design of Monitor was well-suited for river combat, her low freeboard and heavy turret made her highly unseaworthy in rough waters. Sixteen members of the crew were lost.
The Iroquois Theatre fire in Chicago, Illinois, claimed 627 lives on December 30, 1903. It remains the single-building fire in U.S. history with the highest number of fatalities, claiming more than 100 additional lives than the Cocoanut Grove fire in Boston.
Of the roughly 300 actors, dancers, stagehands, and other theatre personnel, only five died: an aerialist (Nellie Reed), an actor in a bit part, an usher, and two female attendants. Reed’s role was that of a fairy; she flew out over the audience on a trolley wire, showering them with pink carnations. She was trapped above the stage while waiting for her entrance. Comedian Eddie Foy was hailed as a hero for attempting to calm the crowd, and his role in the disaster was later recreated by Bob Hope in the film The Seven Little Foys.
One lasting result of the Iroquois Theatre fire was the development of the first panic exit device by the Von Duprin exit device company, now part of Ingersoll Rand. Panic exit devices are now required by building codes for high-occupancy spaces.
December 30, 1916 -
Bunkies, you know I love discussing early 20th-century Russian history as much as the next person, but this item is so good it has to span the course of two days (though it will ultimately reside on December 30 - you’ll see why shortly).
On December 16, 1916 O.S. (Old Style, i.e., the Julian Calendar - meaning December 29 by the modern calendar), a group of nobles decided that Rasputin’s influence over the Tsaritsa had made him far too dangerous a threat to the empire. a group of nobles, led by Prince Felix Yusupov and the Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich (one of the few Romanov family members to escape the annihilation of the family during the Red Terror), apparently lured Rasputin to the Yusupovs' Moika Palace, where they served him cakes and red wine laced with a massive amount of cyanide.
According to legend, Rasputin was unaffected, although Vasily Maklakov had supplied enough poison to kill five men. Conversely, Maria Rasputin's (one of Rasputin's four children) account asserts that, if her father did eat or drink poison, it was not in the cakes or wine, because, after the attack by Khioniya Guseva (she stabbed him in the gut - no surprise - he survived), he had hyperacidity, and avoided anything with sugar. In fact, she expressed doubt that he was poisoned at all.
Yusupov, who had departed without a coat, decided to return to retrieve one and, while there, checked on the body. Suddenly, Rasputin opened his eyes, grabbed Yusupov by the throat, and strangled him. As Rasputin made his bid for freedom, the other conspirators arrived and fired at him. Hit three times in the back, Rasputin fell once more. When they approached, they found—remarkably—that he was still alive and struggling to rise. They clubbed him into submission, wrapped his body in a sheet, and threw him into an icy river, where he finally met his end on the morning of December 17 O.S. (December 30 - as had both of his siblings before him.
Three days later, Rasputin’s body - poisoned, shot four times, and badly beaten - was recovered from the Neva River and autopsied. The official cause of death was hypothermia. His arms were found raised above his head, as if he had tried to claw his way out from under the ice. The autopsy also found evidence that he had indeed been poisoned, and that the poison alone should have been sufficient to kill him.
Another report supporting the idea that Rasputin was still alive when he entered the river noted that water was found in his lungs, indicating that he did not die until after he was submerged beneath the ice. So, apparently, you really can’t keep a very bad man down.
This will be a test.
December 30, 1946 -
Patricia Lee "Patti" Smith, singer-songwriter, poet, artist, Godmother of Punk, Commander of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and inductee in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame was born on this date.
December 30, 1969 -
Peter Tork quit The Monkees buying himself out of his contract for $160,000 which left him broke.
He went on to form a group called Release, played banjo on George Harrison's soundtrack to the film Wonderwall and thoroughly enjoyed the rest of his life.
Before you go - Here's another year-end 2025 Movie Mash-up, -
this time from a new site known as Jakey007.
And here's a brief year in review video from NBC News:
And so it goes
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