This time. we didn't forget the gravy!

June 16, 1950 -
The romantic comedy, Father of the Bride, directed by Vincente Minnelli and starring Spencer Tracy, Joan Bennett, Elizabeth Taylor, Don Taylor, Billie Burke, and Leo G. Carroll, opened in the US on this date.



The surrealist artist Salvador Dali created the sequence where Stanley (Spencer Tracy) has a very weird nightmare over the anxiety of the impending nuptials. As he rushes down the aisle, Stanley's clothes mysteriously get shredded by the tiled floor that bounces and contorts like a piece of flesh. This marked the end of Dalí's work in Hollywood, which also included the famous dream sequence in Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound.


June 16, 1951 -
The Looney Tunes short, Chow Hound, directed by Chuck Jones, debuted on this date.



Because of the dog's mean-spiritedness, lack of sympathy and greed. He's often considered by fans as the most hated character in the entire Looney Tunes franchise as a whole, even more so than other highly-disliked characters such as Buddy, Shep from the short, Fresh Airedale, Henery Hawk, Daffy Duck during his pairings with Speedy Gonzales (though the former is still likeable) and Charlie Dog.


June 16, 1952 -
The first regularly scheduled episode of the TV comedy series, (which was a summer replacement for I Love Lucy,) My Little Margie starring Gale Storm and Charles Farrell debuted on CBS TV on this date.



In an usual move, CBS aired a radio version of the series with the same cast concurrently with the TV series.


June 16, 1954 –
The classic 50s drive-in movie, Them! directed by Gordon Douglas and starring James Whitmore, Edmund Gwenn, Joan Weldon,and James Arness, opened in NYC, on this date.



This film was originally to have been shot in 3-D. Some elements of the 3-D effects, such as the ants having extreme close-ups and the flame throwers shooting straight into the camera, were used. Although the second eye print was filmed, it was never struck, and likely destroyed later.


June 16, 1956 -
The Merrie Melodies short, Napoleon Bunny-Part, directed by Friz Freleng, starring Bugs Bunny, debuted on this date.



The large guard sounds like an early version of Barney Rubble. This is not surprising, as Mel Blanc voiced that character a few years later.


June 16, 1956 -
Gene Vincent (Capitol Record's answer to Elvis Presley) and the Bluecaps' (so named after Ike's golf cap) Be-Bop-A-Lula, was released on this date.



Recorded in Nashville on May 4, 1956, this was released as the B-side of Vincent's first single, a provocative number called Woman Love. Radio stations in the United States wanted nothing to do with Woman Love, and the BBC banned it, so Capitol flipped the sides and put out Be-Bop-a-Lula as the A-side; for some reason the scandalous Woman Love was deemed inoffensive when relegated to a B-side.


June 16, 1958 -
The classic Hammer horror film, Dracula (AKA House of Dracula,) directed by Terence Fisher and starring Peter Cushing, Michael Gough, Melissa Stribling, and Christopher Lee, opened in the UK, on this date.



Christopher Lee has only sixteen lines, as Dracula, in the entire film, all spoken by the 10 minute mark.


June 16, 1960 -
Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho opened in New York on this date.



Alfred Hitchcock originally envisioned the shower sequence as completely silent, but Bernard Herrmann went ahead and scored it anyway, and upon hearing it, Hitchcock immediately changed his mind. Alfred Hitchcock was so pleased with the score written by Bernard Herrmann that he doubled the composer's salary to $34,501. Hitchcock later said, "Thirty-three percent of the effect of Psycho was due to the music."


June 16, 1967 -
The 3-day Monterey Pop Festival began, kicking off ‘The Summer of Love’ and securing California as the focal point of the counterculture movement. All the proceeds of the concert went to charity as all the artists agreed to perform for free.



It was the first major US appearance by The Who, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin, and became the inspiration for future music festivals, like Woodstock two years later. The entire festival was recorded by D.A.Pennebaker for a documentary and record set, which inspired tens of thousands of American youth to move to the West Coast.


June 16, 1979 -
The Supertramp song Logical Song peaked at #6 on the Billboard Charts, on this date.



To accentuate the "d-d-digital" line in the lyrics, the band borrowed a Mattel handheld electronic football game from an engineer named Richard Digby-Smith, who was working next door. This device, which predated Nintendo, provided an unusual sounding, layered bleep. The specific byte occurs near the end of the song just after Hodgson sings the word "digital." The sound itself indicated a player had lost control of the football.


June 16, 1984 -
Cyndi Lauper's song Time After Time topped the charts (her first no.1 hit) on this date.



Captain Lou Albano, who appeared in the Girls Just Want To Have Fun video, played a cook at a diner in this one. Lauper's mom and boyfriend were also in the video, portraying her mom and boyfriend. The video was directed by Edd Griles, who had worked with Lauper since her days in the band Blue Angel. He also did her videos for Girls Just Want To Have Fun and She Bop.


June 16, 1984 -
Frankie Goes To Hollywood had their second UK No.1 single, on this date, with Two Tribes. It stayed at No.1 for nine weeks making Frankie Goes To Hollywood the first band to have their first two singles go to the top of the UK chart. During this run the group's previous single Relax climbed back up the charts to No.2.



Former 10cc band members Lol Creme and Kevin Godley produced a memorable video featuring a no-holds-barred, hand-to-hand fight between Ronald Reagan and then Soviet leader Konstantin Chernenko. Godley recalled to Q magazine: "It was a very intense shoot. We were trying to get the audience to behave in a manner that we wanted to by chanting, 'Kill! Kill! Kill!' A few of them seriously got into the spirit of it by jumping in the ring and beating each other up!"


June 16, 1997 -
The Verve released Bitter Sweet Symphony in the UK on this date. The song lives up to it's title: the song is a huge hit, but Mick Jagger and Keith Richards end up getting credits and royalties.



The famous orchestral riff incorporates a sample from an obscure instrumental version of the 1965 Rolling Stones song The Last Time by Stones producer Andrew Loog Oldham, who included it on a 1966 album called The Rolling Stones Songbook (credited to The Andrew Oldham Orchestra).



The Verve got permission to use the six-second sample from Decca Records, which owned the Oldham recording, but they also needed permission from the publisher of The Last Time, something they didn't realize until after the album was completed.


Today's moment ofZen


Today in History:
June 16 1750 BC -
King Hammurabi died in Babylon on this date and was succeeded by his son Samsu-iluna.



I know you're saying to yourself, "Who cares?". Well, now you know.


June 16, 1556 -
Keep this in mind: Always read your Baedeker before traveling.




June 16, 1858 -
More than 1,000 Republican delegates met in the Springfield, Illinois, statehouse for the Republican State Convention. By late afternoon, they chose Abraham Lincoln as their candidate for the U.S. Senate, running against Democrat Stephen A. Douglas.

Later that evening, Lincoln delivered this address to his Republican colleagues in the Hall of Representatives. The title comes a sentence from the speech's introduction, "A house divided against itself cannot stand," which paraphrases a statement by Jesus in the New Testament.



If only Lincoln had read his Scriptures a little more closely he would have uncovered the passage that had confused many biblical scholars, "Hey Abe, Don't go to Ford's Theatre on Good Friday."


June 16, 1890 -
British comedian Arthur Stanley Jefferson (Stan Laurel), was born on this date. He acted in 190 films (many of them with his partner Oliver Hardy) and was awarded a Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement in 1961.



He died in 1965 from a heart attack. At Laurel's funeral, Buster Keaton said, "Chaplin wasn't the funniest, I wasn't the funniest, this man was the funniest."


June 16, 1904 -
Happy Bloomsday!

Every June 16 (the date on which the novel is set,) the reader of Ulysses celebrate the day Leo Bloom takes his famous walk around Dublin. James Joyce fans mark the date each year, greeting one another joyously

- Yes - yes - yes! they'll nervously titter. They'll think themselves very clever (at least they will, anyway.)



They'll feel smart and proud and better than the rest of us (and you again can feel morally superior for knowing it), and now you know why.


June 16, 1948 -
In the first skyjacking of a commercial plane, three armed men stormed the cockpit of the Miss Macao, a passenger seaplane operated by Cathay Pacific airline.

When the pilot refuses to turn over the controls, he was shot dead and the plane crashes into the ocean. The only survivor among the 27 people on board was the leader of the terrorists.

Oops.


June 16, 1958 -
Imre Nagy, once prime minister of Hungary for all of ten days, was executed by the Soviet Union for attempting to withdraw his country from the Warsaw Pact on this date.



It is said that Nikita Khrushchev had Nagy executed, "as a lesson to all other leaders in socialist countries."

That'll learn em.


June 16, 1959 -
While entertaining friends at his home, George Reeves (Ben Affleck), who played the title character in the original Superman TV series, went upstairs to his bedroom and committed suicide with a 9mm German Luger.



This has been hotly debated and it is now believe that the irate husband of a B movie actress Reeves was sleeping with, shot the actor in his home.


June 16, 1961 -
This may be a shock to some of you readers but some male ballet dancers engage in an active sodomy lifestyle. Rudolf Nureyev was a major buggerer, much to the consternation of both the Kirov management and the Russian political authorities. In the Kirov's first-ever appearance in Paris in 1961, Nureyev was an outstanding success, yet his defiance of company regulations about mingling with foreigners, provoked a command return to Moscow.



Rudolf Nureyev defected from the Kirov Ballet at Le Bourget Airport in France while he was on the verge of flying back to USSR on this date. Within five days, Nureyev embarked on a six-month season with the international Grand Ballet du Marquis de Cuevas, dancing the Prince and the Blue Bird in The Sleeping Beauty.


June 16, 1963 -
Valentina Tereshkova was the first female to travel outside the Earth's atmosphere, on this date.



She orbited the Earth 48 times aboard the Soviet Union's Vostok 6. She is still the only woman ever to go on a solo space mission.


June 16, 1976 -
15,000 schoolchildren took to the streets of Soweto to protest South Africa's adoption of bilingual instruction in the Afrikaans language.



The nonviolent march ended abruptly when police and soldiers opened fire on the crowd, killing 600 and igniting days of rioting throughout the region.


June 16, 1999 -
The founder of the United Kingdom's Monster Raving Loony Party, one Screaming Lord Sutch (real name David Edward Sutch, 3rd Earl of Harrow), was found hanged at his late mother's residence. Sutch was the longest lasting party leader in the UK at the time of his death, which was ruled a suicide.



One of the Loony Party planks was, all vegetables sold in supermarkets, should be clearly marked “Strictly for oral use only”


Before you go - as a service to our readers - ACME would like to point out as much as it makes you laugh -

this is an unacceptable Father's Day gifts for Dad.



And so it goes.

I might wait until Sunday to celebrate

Today is National lobster Day. I'm not sure if the holiday is celebrating this crustacean for its' longevity or its' delicious taste. Yes I know that if you are celebrating National Lobster Day today, you are celebrating the consumption of Canadian lobsters and not our own national variety. I don't care, I love lobsters, especially in my tummy, floating in a sea of gin, especially Bombay Sapphire. (What alcohol you like your pre-digested crustaceans to float in, is between you and your god.)

If you feel you must, celebrate National Lobster Day on the 25th of September, when you clearly will be honoring the Maine variety. Once again, need I remind the gentle reader that, National Martini Day is June 19th, and Father's Day is also June 20th; I know I have lobster in my future.



Here's a tip from your old friend, the doctor: Look for a lobster that seems active and alive, and the more active, the better. If you are not squeamish, remove the rubber bands before dispatching your lobsters.

Here's a tip from your old friend, the doctor: Look for a lobster that seems active and alive, and the more active, the better. If you are not squeamish, remove the rubber bands before dispatching your lobsters.

If you have the time please take a tip from one of our bunkies, consider reading David Foster Wallace's classic essay, "Consider the Lobster."


June 15, 1938 -
The under-rated screwball comedy, Holiday, directed by George Cukor, and starring Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, Doris Nolan, Lew Ayres, and Edward Everett Horton, opened on this date.



Katharine Hepburn understudied the role of Linda Seton (played by Hope Williams) in the original Broadway play. She also performed a scene from Holiday for her first screen test, which led to her first film role.


June 15, 1948 -
The very successful comedy, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, directed by Charles Barton, and starring Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Lon Chaney Jr., Bela Lugosi, Glenn Strange, Lenore Aubert, and Jane Randolph, opened on this date.



Lou Costello didn't want to make the movie, declaring, "No way I'll do that crap. My little girl could write something better than this." A $50,000 advance in salary and the signing of director Charles Barton, the team's good friend and the man some call their best director, convinced him otherwise.


June 15, 1960 -
The Apartment, starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine, opened in New York on this date. This was the follow-up film to Billy Wilder's smash hit Some Like It Hot.



Billy Wilder originally thought of the idea for the film after seeing Brief Encounter and wondering about the plight of a character unseen in that film -- the person who lends his apartment for an extramarital tryst. Shirley MacLaine was only given forty pages of the script because Wilder didn't want her to know how the story would turn out. She thought it was because the script wasn't finished.


June 15, 1967 -
The WWII adventure film, The Dirty Dozen, premiered on this date.



The scene where one of the dozen pretends to be a General inspecting Robert Ryan's troops was initially written for Samson Posey (Clint Walker). However, Walker was uncomfortable with this scene, so Director Robert Aldrich decided to use Donald Sutherland instead. The scene was directly responsible for Sutherland being cast in MASH, which made him an international star.


June 15, 1973 -
Motown Records released Marvin Gaye's hit single Let's Get It On, on this date.



Co-written by Ed Townsend (he had a big hit in 1958, For Your Love), the song originally addressed the author's desire to get on with life after beating alcoholism. Marvin Gaye completely changed the lyrics (and meaning) to the song after meeting Janis Hunter, the woman who would become his second wife.
 


June 15, 1973 -
20th Century Fox releases the fifth and final entry in the Planet of the Apes series, Battle for the Planet of the Apes, directed by J. Lee Thompson and starring Roddy McDowall, Claude Akins, Natalie Trundy, John Huston, and Paul Williams, was released on this date.



Roddy McDowall and Natalie Trundy are the only cast members to appear in four of the five original Planet of the Apes movies. McDowall appeared in all except the first sequel Beneath the Planet of the Apes, unless you include the flashback at the beginning for which he received an uncredited appearance. Natalie Trundy did not appear in the Planet of the Apes, but appeared in all four sequels. McDowall also starred in the television series Planet of the Apes. William Beckley (the British newscaster on Escape From the Planet of the Apes) and Woodrow Parfrey (Dr. Maximus on Planet of the Apes) both appeared as chimpanzees on the series' pilot, and Bobby Porter (Cornelius on this film) appeared as a young chimp on two episodes (the pilot being one of them).


June 15, 1983 -
The BBC comedy series The Black Adder starring Rowan Atkinson and Tony Robinson premiered on this date.



Rowan Atkinson has a stutter, which causes him to struggle with the letter 'B.' He has to visualise the letter before he says it - which is why he puts extra emphasis on words containing that letter. Eg Bob. Later he created the character Mr. Bean for this reason.


June 15, 1989 -
Nirvana's debut album, Bleach, was released, on this date.



The album Bleach initially sold about 35,000 copies, which was pretty good for an Indie band and got them signed to a major label. The album eventually sold over 1 million copies, as many Nirvana fans bought it after Cobain died. The album cost about $600 to produce. They got the title from a public service campaign in San Francisco that urged intravenous drug users to "Bleach Your Works," meaning to clean their needles with bleach so they would not spread the AIDS virus.


June 15, 1990 -
Warren Beatty's take on the comic strip detective, Dick Tracy, opened on this date.



Al Pacino has stated that Madonna flashed him during rehearsals for this movie, opening her coat to reveal that she was naked underneath. Pacino joked that when he is old if he is observed with a beatific smile on his face, it will be because he is recalling the incident.


June 15, 1994 -
Disney's 32nd animated feature, The Lion King, opened in limited release in the US on this date.



The team working on the film was supposedly Disney's "team B," who were "kept busy" while "team A" worked on Pocahontas, on which the production had much higher hopes. As it turned out, The Lion King became a huge critical and commercial success, whereas Pocahontas met with mixed reviews and a much lower box office.


June 15, 2007 -
Bob Barker's final episode as the host of The Price is Right airs on this date.



Barker himself took it all in stride. He mentioned less about the occasion than he did for his 6,000th show. His final sign off at the close of the show: “Folks, I want to thank you very, very much for inviting me into your homes for the last fifty years. I am deeply grateful.” Then, with his signature touch, he added “Please remember: help control the pet population, have your pet spayed or neutered. Goodbye!”


Word of the Day


Today in History:
June 15, 1215 -
King John was forced by all the English Barons to sign the Magna Carta, which asserted the supremacy of the law over the king, at Runnymede, England on this date.



The Magna Carta (the Great Charter) was adopted and sealed by the King at Runnymede, England, granting his barons more liberty.


June 15, 1330 -
Please take notes, this will be on the test:

So much history over unsupported hosiery:

King Edward III was a famous English king, celebrated for his invention of manners and discovery of the economy. He played tennis and once famously rebuked the King of France for having sent him his balls in a box.



King Edward established the Order of the Garter because he was what English nobles referred to as a "leg man." (It was he who also famously remarked, Honi soit qui mal y pense, or "Honey, show us some cheesecake.")

King Edward had many sons, one of whom was born on June 15, 1330. This son he named Prince Edward. Though white at birth, he eventually became England's first Black Prince.

Prince Edward eventually married Joan of Kent. In her youth, Joan had been known as the Fairly Maid because she was so fat; in later years she was referred to as Chubster and Lardass, though seldom to her face.

At the age of sixteen, Prince Edward and his father, the king, led the English against the French at Crécy in order to start the Hundred Years' War. There were many more French than English, but the English had the advantage of the Long Boa. The French were powerless against this innovation.

Ten years later, the English and French took the field again, this time at Poitiers. The French had learned from experience and tried to counter the English Long Boa with their own Very Large Scarf. They failed. The English took France's King John prisoner and ransomed him for half a million pounds (250 tons). Prince Edward was kind to the French king, however, and prayed with him, proving that the apple had not fallen far from the tree. (Edward was also a leg man.)

By now he had become the Black Prince.



In recognition of his prowess, the Black Prince was made ruler of Aquitaine in 1362. When some of the French rebelled at Limoges in 1370, he had all 3,000 inhabitants killed. This resulted in peace. The Black Prince died before he could succeed to the throne, thereby losing the opportunity to become England's first Black King.



Edward and Joan had two children. One was Edward, who died in infancy and was therefore ineligible to be king. The other was Richard, also known as Richard II, who succeeded to the throne only to abdicate in favor of Henry IV, Part 1. Following Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2, came Henry V, then Henry VI, Parts 1, 2, and 3, and finally Richard III.

This kept William Shakespeare busy for many years.


June 15, 1409 -
Petros Philargos was elected Pope Alexander V by the Council of Pisa on this date in 1409. This poses a certain amount of difficulty and increased the amount of Papal Bull, as there already was a Pope in Rome, Gregory XII, and another in Avignon, Benedict XII. Ultimately, none of the three was willing to step down, leading the Chuch into a double schism.



This made papal dispensations a drug on the market.


June 15, 1520 -
Pope Leo X (no relation to Malcolm or Generation) threatened to excommunicate Martin Luther with a papal bull, on this date. (Luther was officially excommunicated on January 3rd, 1521.)



This made papal dispensations a drug on the market.


June 15, 1520 -
Pope Leo X (no relation to Malcolm or Generation) threatened to excommunicate Martin Luther with a papal bull, on this date. (Luther was officially excommunicated on January 3rd, 1521.)

Pope Leo X is famous for his use of papal bulls although not quite as famous (and we know it's not true) as Catherine the Great was for her use of horses (I'm really sorry that I made that joke.)


June 15,1667 -
Dr. Jean-Baptiste Denys, the personal physician to Louis XIV, performed the first blood transfusion in history on this date. He performed the transfusion on a fifteen year old boy, using blood drawn from the severed neck of a sheep.

While the experiment was considered a success (the boy died?), it was clearly a disappointment if you were rooting for the sheep.


June 15, 1752 -
Benjamin Franklin and his son tested the relationship between electricity and lightning by flying a kite in a thunder storm on this date (or some other date, don't forget Mr. Franklin was a member of the notorious Hellfire Club.) There is no record on how much the Franklins drank earlier that day.

This now proved the famous theory that lightning is some powerful sh*t.


June 15, 1785 -
Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier died during an attempted crossing of the English Channel when his balloon, a combination hydrogen and hot air balloon, exploded on this date.

Thus, he and his companion, Pierre Romain, became the first known victims of an air crash. The term "pilot" is sometimes erroneously thought to derive from his first name, Pilatre.


June 15, 1859 -
The Great Pig War (aka the San Juan Boundary Dispute) between the US and UK/Canada begun in June of 1859, lasted 12 whole years and was started over a very hungry pig. At maximum belligerence, the order of battle included 2,600 ground troops, five powerful ships of the line, and nearly a hundred cannon.



But fortunately, the combatants never actually got around to doing much combatting. In fact, the only recorded injury was a Royal Marine who got hit in the eye by a rock thrown from the American trenches. He was shipped to a nearby military hospital, recuperated, and eventually rejoined his unit. Most of the opposing troops' energies were spent sneaking across the lines to each other's outposts - to play cards, swap stories, and to trade American tobacco and fresh food for navy rum swiped from the British quartermaster's stores. The Americans invited the British to celebrate 4th of July with them, while the yanks would visit the British for Victoria’s birthday celebrations. The biggest threat to peace at this time was the enormous amount of alcohol, as well as shady suppliers, that appeared on the island.



The two forces waited until finally, in 1872, all of the two nations’ remaining squabbles were brought out into the open. One by one all the border grievances remaining were addressed and (mostly) resolved, until eventually the focus fell on San Juan Island. It was decided that because the two nations both insisted on stubbornly claiming the land, the fate of the island would be decided by international arbitration, with no other than Kaiser Wilhem I of Germany to act as arbitrator.

All wars should be fought like this.


June 15, 1904 -
The General Slocum worked as a passenger ship, taking people on excursions around New York City. On this date, the ship had been chartered for $350 by the St. Mark's Evangelical Lutheran Church in the German district Little Germany, Manhattan. This was an annual rite for the group, which had made the trip for 17 consecutive years. Over 1,300 passengers, mostly women and children, boarded the General Slocum. It was to sail up the East River and then eastward across Long Island Sound to Locust Grove, a picnic site in Eatons Neck, Long Island. It caught fire and burned to the water line in New York's East River.



More than 1,000 people died in the accident, making it New York City's worst loss-of-life disaster until the September 11, 2001 attacks.


June 15, 1921 -
Bessie Coleman was the first woman of African-American and Native-American descent to hold a pilot license. She earned her license from France's Caudron Brother's School of Aviation in just several months after starting at the school, on this date.



Coleman became a high profile pilot in notoriously dangerous air shows in the United States. Popularly known as Queen Bess and Brave Bessie, she died in a plane crash in 1926 while testing a new aircraft.


June 15, 1955 -
Duck and cover, people.



The Eisenhower administration stages the first annual OPAL exercise. In the Operation Alert drill, air raid sirens blare across America to assess our preparations for a nuclear attack.


June 15, 1992 -
What a waste it is to lose one's mind. Or not to have a mind is being very wasteful. - Dan Quayle



Vice President Dan Quayle, relying on a faulty flash card, erroneously instructed a Trenton, N.J., elementary school student to spell "potato" as "potatoe" during a spelling bee.

Clearly, how true that is.



And so it goes.

Take heart

While it may be Bread and Circuses down in DC.

It was Knicks in 5 and there are 200 days until New Year's Eve! (And there are 142 days until November 3.)



Reservations are still available - Plan accordingly


You may remain seated while reading this, but please remove your hat:

It was on this date in 1777 that the Stars and Stripes was adopted as the official flag of the United States of America.



The first Flag Day observance was not held on the 100th anniversary of the adoption of the Stars and Stripes on June 14, 1877, as some sites might tell you. But read on, bunkies; this seems to be the real story:



In 1861, at the start of the Civil War, a man named George Morris persuaded his city of Hartford, CT, to undertake a patriotic celebration on behalf of the Union. But the concept didn't catch on, either there or elsewhere.



Two decades later, in 1885, a 19-year-old Waubeka schoolteacher named Bernard Cigrand plunked a small flag into an inkwell on his desk and assigned his students to write essays on patriotism. Later, he traveled the country promoting respect for the flag and eventually became president of the American Flag Day Association.

In 1916, after years of toil, Cigrand persuaded President Woodrow Wilson to issue a proclamation on May 30, 1916, calling for a nationwide observance of Flag Day.



In 1949, President Harry Truman signed an Act of Congress designating the 14th day of June each year as National Flag Day.



So now you know. (You may now be seated and put your hat back on.)


June 14, 1939 -
Ethel Waters became the first African-American singer to perform on television on this date when she appeared in an NBC variety show. (Unfortunately, other than publicity stills, the program was not recorded and videotapes of it do not exist.)

Waters was also the first African-American woman to be given equal billing with white stars in Broadway shows, and to play leading roles in Hollywood films.


June 14, 1949 -
A truly dark comedy, Kind Hearts and Coronets, directed by Robert Hamer, and starring Dennis Price, Joan Greenwood, Valerie Hobson and the ever present Alec Guinness, opened in London on this date.



The scene where six members of the D'Ascoyne's family, all played by Alec Guinness, are seen together, took two days to film. The camera was set on a specially built platform to minimize movement. In addition, the camera operator spent the night with the camera to ensure that nothing moved it by accident. A frame with six black matte painted optical flat glass windows was set in front of the camera, and the windows opened one at a time so each of the characters could be filmed in turn. The film was then wound back for the next character. Most of the time was spent waiting for Guinness to be made up as the next character.


June 14, 1959 –
The first daily operating monorail system in the Western Hemisphere, Disneyland's Monorail System, had it's grand opening in Anaheim, California, on this date.



The Nixon's enjoyed their ride but the ride had to be taken off-line while it took them several hours to hose out the cars to get rid of the stench of his sweat.


June 14, 1967 -
One of the iconic films from the 60s, the British drama To Sir, with Love, starring Sidney Poitier premiered in the US on this date.



Based on the semi-autobiographical novel by E.R. Braithwaite and his experiences teaching in a tough secondary school in a poor area of post-war East London the film's portrayal of Braithwaite's character may not have been entirely accurate. After the film was released, several former pupils of Braithwaite's claimed that, the real Braithwaite was a stern and tough disciplinarian who often used corporal punishment in class and was far from the sympathetic and likeable character as played by Sidney Poitier.


June 14, 1970 –
The Grateful Dead released their fourth studio album, Workingman's Dead, on this date. In 2003, the album was ranked number 262 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.



This was one of the Dead's first attempts to reach beyond their little cult and take a shot at the mainstream. According to Dennis McNally, the band's biographer and publicist, a Warner Bros. executive was so ecstatic when he heard Uncle John's Band, which he considered a marketable song from the band, it sent him running down the hallways with the news. "He was expecting more of Anthem Of The Sun stuff, and he ran down the corridors of Warner Bros., screaming, 'The Grateful Dead have written a song we can put on the radio!' And he was very happy."


June 14, 1975 –
The band America's single, (from their fifth album Hearts,) Sister Golden Hair went to No.1 on the Billboard singles chart, on this date. It was the group’s second No.1



George Martin, who was The Beatles producer, produced this track and the rest of the Hearts album (he started working with America on their previous album, Holiday). It was Martin's 20th US #1 as a producer, and his first away from The Beatles (by this point, each former Beatle had reached #1 outside of the group). Martin would have three chart-toppers: Ebony and Ivory, Say Say Say and Candle In The Wind '97.


June 14, 1976 -
The Gong Show debuted on NBC on this date. People with dubious talents perform their acts before a celebrity panel of judges, who are free to eject the performer at any time by banging a large gong. The best non-gonged performer each night wins $516.32.



During the time the show is on the air, it's creator, Chuck Barris, suffered a complete mental breakdown, he said from the stress of being a secret CIA hit man.



No really, I'm not kidding you.


June 14, 1985 -
One of John Houston's last films, the black comedy Prizzi's Honor, starring Jack Nicholson, Kathleen Turner, Anjelica Huston, Robert Loggia, John Randolph, CCH Pounder, Lawrence Tierney, William Hickey, and Stanley Tucci (in his film debut,) opened on this date.



John Huston is the only director to direct two members of his own family to win Academy Awards. The first was his father Walter Huston in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, who won Best Actor in a Supporting Role, then his daughter Anjelica Huston won Best Actress in Supporting Role for this movie.


June 14, 1985 -
Michael Nesmith in Television Parts, a 30-minute comedy-variety show summer replacement series (a sequel of sort to his Grammy Award-winning video Elephant Parts) premiered on NBC-TV on this date. It was hosted by Nez himself, who participated in many of the sketches. Television Parts also featured guest appearances by a variety of comedians, including Martin Mull, Whoopi Goldberg, Jay Leno, Jerry Seinfeld, Bill Martin, and Garry Shandling, whose appearance laid the foundation for It's Garry Shandling's Show.



Unfortunately, the series was canceled after just five episodes. The last airing ran for 90 minutes and was broadcasted in the Saturday Night Live time slot.


June 14, 1997 -
Puff Daddy and Faith Evans started a 11 week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with I'll Be Missing You, a tribute to the late Notorious B.I.G., on this date.



The song samples Every Breath You Take by The Police, which was one of Diddy's favorite songs. He didn't sort out the legal issues until after the song was released. Sting, who wrote the Police song, was granted a writers credit, resulting in substantial royalties. Sting appreciated the sentiment in Diddy using Every Breath You Take to honor his fallen friend. The Police frontman even performed the song with Diddy and his crew at the MTV Video Music Awards, where he sang the chorus.


Another album from the discount bin at The ACME Record Shoppe 


Today in History:
June 14, 1648 -
Midwife Margaret Jones was hanged in Boston for witchcraft on this date.

It is the first such execution for the Massachusetts colony, but not the first in the colonies.


June 14, 1940 -
Rick Blaine and Ilsa Lund had a quick drink as they planned to leave Paris, with their friend Sam, ahead of the Nazi invasion. Little does Rick know that Ilsa does not plan to join him (but that's another story ....)



Paris fell to the Nazis on this date. Marshal Philippe Petain became the head of the French government and sued for peace. Gertrude Stein translated Petain's speeches and hailed him as a hero of the French nation.

And sometimes, a rose is just a collaborator.


June 14, 1946 -
Anyone who thinks my story is anywhere near over is sadly mistaken.

Donald Trump was born on this date. That's all I'm going to say.


June 14, 1949 -
Albert II was launched into the Space inside a V-2 rocket. Everything went as planned in beginning his rocket reached a height of 134 km and Albert II became the first mammal to reach space.



After spending a few minutes in Space his capsule returned back to the Earth. While re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere his capsule's parachute system did not work and he died upon impact. The take away for today - do not travel with anyone, man or primate, named Albert into space.


June 14, 1951 -
UNIVAC I (Universal Automatic Computer), developed by J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, makers of ENIAC, was presented to the general public, on this date. Designed for the U.S. Census Bureau, it was billed as the world's first commercial computer.



UNIVAC I, as the first successful civilian computer, was a key part of the dawn of the computer age. Despite early delays, the UNIVAC program at the Census Bureau was a great success. The Bureau purchased a second UNIVAC I machine in the mid-1950's, and two UNIVAC 1105 computers for the 1960 census.


June 14, 1954 -
At the Lincoln Memorial, President Dwight Eisenhower signs a law inserting the words "under God" into the Pledge of Allegiance. Eisenhower declares: "From this day forward, the millions of our schoolchildren will daily proclaim in every city and town, every village and rural schoolhouse, the dedication of our nation and our people to the Almighty." Precisely which Almighty is left to the listener's imagination.

This year, I'd like to think that Ike was thinking about the deity Xochiquetzal..


June 14, 1961 -
Let's face it: I've got a bit of a reputation.



1980s pop music star George Alan O'Dowd was born in Kent, England on this date.


June 14, 1962 -
Albert Henry DeSalvo, a small time petty criminal confessed that he murdered Anna Slesersby, a petite divorcee, by strangling her with the belt from her robe on this date. She was only the first victim of The Boston Strangler.

A few years ago there was positive DNA evidence to link DeSalvo to the crimes.


June 14, 1963 -
The Soviet spacecraft Vostok 5 was launched into orbit on this date. Over the course of the next five days, Cosmonaut Valery Bykovsky would set a new record for the longest manned space flight in history.



The record would later be broken by the crew of Gemini 7, but Bykovsky will continue to hold the endurance record for a solo flight.


June 14, 1966 -
The Vatican announced the abolition of its Index librorum prohibitorum (Index of Prohibited Books), originally instituted in 1557 by Pope Paul IV. Notable novelists on the list have been Laurence Sterne, Voltaire, Daniel Defoe, Honor de Balzac, Jean-Paul Sartre.

If you are ever in doubt of what to read - check out the Index.


June 14, 1989 -
Zsa Zsa Gabor was arrested for slapping a Beverly Hills police officer and driving with an expired license. Afterwards Zsa Zsa complains to the press that the handling she received from the BHPD "was like Nazi Germany."


Ultimately, Gabor is convicted and sentenced to 72 hours in jail.


And on a personal note:

Happy Birthday Thierry


One more thing -

This is not an acceptable gift for Father's Day. Just saying.



And so it goes.