Remember that most of Southern Europe starts their vacations today

Today is the Feast of Assumption of Mary. While the Feast of Assumption of Mary, also known as the Dormition of the Mother of God, only became a Holy Day of Obligation recently - on November 1, 1950, Pope Pius XII defined the Assumption of Mary to be a dogma of faith. In fact, the Feast of the Assumption is one of the oldest holy days in the Church, with accounts of celebrations going back to the sixth century.)

If you have problems understanding this or the Immaculate Conception, remember the old lady in church, saying her rosaries that I've made mention of in the past, please go bother her, I'm not even going to try explaining this one to you. Not that I can't - I just want to see her smack you upside the head.


August 15, 1918 -
The Sinking of the Lusitania, written and directed by Winsor McCay, went into general release in the U.S. on this date.



It is the first full-length feature cartoon documentary, featuring over twenty five thousand individual drawings which took twenty-two months to produce. The twelve minute silent film is a an educational explanation of the sinking of the RMS Lusitania.


August 15, 1948 -
CBS-TV inaugurated the first nightly news broadcast with anchorman Douglas Edwards.



Mr. Edwards held the job for 14 years and was succeeded by Walter Cronkite.


August 15, 1959 -
The Looney Tunes short, Cat's Paw, directed by Bob McKimson, and starring Sylvester the Cat and Junior, was released on this date.



When Sylvester Jr. wonders where the yellow went (in this case, yellow being cowardice), it's actually a pun on a popular advertising campaign for Pepsodent Toothpaste. "You'll wonder where the yellow went when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent!"


August 15, 1964 -
Dean Martin's song Everybody Loves Somebody knocks The Beatles' A Hard Day's Night from the #1 spot on the Hot 100 on this date.



In 1964, Dean Martin was finishing up recording his Dream with Dean album and had completed 11 songs. Albums always had 12 songs in the US, so Dean asked his conductor and piano player, Ken Lane, if he had something else for him. Ken said he had an old song he had written - Everybody Loves Somebody. Dean liked it and recorded it with just Ken, a bass player, a guitar and drums. The reaction to the cut on the album was so great that Dean went back into the studio and re-recorded it for a single release with a full orchestra and background singers.


August 15, 1979 -
Neal Israel's futuristic comedy film, Americathon, starring John Ritter, Fred Willard, Peter Riegert, Harvey Korman, and Nancy Morgan, with narration by George Carlin, premiered in the US on this date.



Dorothy Stratten appears in an uncredited role wearing a Playboy Bunny style costume in the scene where Roy Budnitz donates blood.


August 15, 1979 -
The very long delayed epic, Apocalypse Now, premiered in NYC on this date. (Order some Banh xeo and a couple of bottles of Tiger Beer, and watch the Redux version, in honor of the anniversary.)



It took Francis Ford Coppola nearly three years to edit the footage. While working on his final edit, it became apparent to him that Martin Sheen would be needed to tape several additional narrative voice-overs. Coppola soon discovered that Sheen was busy, and unable to perform these voice-overs. He then called in Sheen's brother, Joe Estevez, whose voice sounded nearly identical, to perform the new narrative tracks. Estevez was also used as a stand-in when Sheen suffered a heart attack during the shoot in 1976. Estevez was not credited for his work as a stand-in, nor for his voice-over work.


August 15, 1981 -
Diana Ross and Lionel Richie started a nine week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with Endless Love, on this date.



This was released on the Motown label, which was home to both artists (the Commodores were a Motown act, and Richie stayed on the label as a solo artist). Ross, though, left Motown two months before it was released, signing a $20 million deal with RCA. Motown made the most of what they had recorded from Ross, and included Endless Love on a Diana Ross compilation album called All the Great Hits, which was also released in 1981.


August 15, 1984 -
The cult classic sci-fi film, The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension, directed by W. D. Richter and starring Peter Weller, Ellen Barkin, John Lithgow, Jeff Goldblum, and Christopher Lloyd, opened in the US on this date.



According to Peter Weller, he had a particularly tough time filming the scene without laughing where Lord John Whorfin (Dr. Lizardo) is torturing Buckaroo with electricity, because it was the first time he had heard John Lithgow perform what Weller likes to refer to as John's "Italian/Martian accent".

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


Today in History:
August 15, 1057 -
Macbeth was killed at the Battle of Lumphanan in Aberdeenshire on this date, by Malcolm Canmore, the eldest son of King Duncan I, who was deposed by Macbeth years earlier



He had been king of Scotland for 17 years. For those of you who do not know, you're not suppose to say the name of the Scottish king 'aloud'.


August 15, 1534 -
St. Ignatius of Loyola, Spanish ecclesiastic, founded the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) in Paris with the aim of defending Catholicism against heresy and undertaking missionary work, on this date. Ignatius converted to Christianity while convalescing after a battle and wrote his Spiritual Exercises meant as a guide for conversion.

In Paris, Ignatius and a small group of men took vows of poverty, chastity and papal obedience. Ignatius formally organized the order in 1539 that was approved by the pope in 1540. The society‘s rapid growth and emphasis on scholarship aided in the resurgence of Catholicism during the Counter-Reformation.

You may now impress your friends with that bit of knowledge.


August 15, 1843 -
Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen, Denmark, the world's second oldest amusement park still in operation, offers rides such as roller coasters and carousels as well as exotic flower gardens, opened on this date. Today, it is the most visited amusement park in Scandinavia.



The world's oldest amusement park still in operation is the Dyrehavsbakken park, also in Denmark.


August 15, 1877 -
Thomas Edison wrote to the president of the Telegraph Company in Pittsburgh, PA on this date (stay with me.)



The letter stated that the word, "hello" would be a more appropriate greeting than "ahoy" when answering the telephone.

So now you know


August 15, 1911 -
Procter and Gamble unveiled Crisco shortening on this date.

The new motto should be, "When you open our can, the party's started!"


August 15, 1914 -
The SS Ancon cargo ship was the first to pass through the newly-built Panama Canal on this date.



Today, more than 14,000 ships pass through each year.


August 15,1914 -
111 years ago today, Julian Carlton, a servant of architect Frank Lloyd Wright burned down Wright's Wisconsin home, Taliesin and murdered seven people, including Wright's lover, Mamah Borthwick Cheney, and her two children. Wright was in Chicago at the time, working on a project.



Carlton was almost immediately captured and jailed, but died six weeks later (a result of having swallowed acid), without uttering a meaningful word about the motive behind his rampage.


August 15, 1935 -
Will Rogers, the most famous man in America, died near Barrow, Alaska when his sea plane plunges into a lagoon. At the time, he and one-eyed aviator Wiley Post were surveying possible flight paths between Seattle and the Soviet Union.



Remember bunkies, let this be a lesson to you - don't take a flight with a drunken, one eyed pilot.


August 15, 1945 -
Harry Truman hadn't sobered up yet. He could not quite believe that he was President and got to drop not one but two atomic bombs.



Truman had announced the Japanese surrender the day before. But it was on this day in 1945 that the Allies officially declared V-J Day.


Aug 15, 1947 -
At the stroke of midnight on the 14th of August, Britain withdrew its control on the jewel in its crown and India and Pakistan became two separate, independent, democratic nations,after some 200 years of British rule.



The division of Pakistan from India prompted mass emigration: Muslims moving west to Pakistan and Hindus moving east toward India. The event also unleashed a period of religious turmoil in India and Pakistan that would result in the deaths of hundreds of thousands, including Gandhi.


August 15, 1965 -
The Beatles played to nearly 60,000 fans at Shea Stadium in New York City, on this date, marking the birth of stadium rock.



People tend to forget that this was one of the first major stadium concerts by a rock group.


August 15, 1969 -
The Woodstock Music and Arts Fair began on this date, on Max Yasger's farm in upstate New York.



The greatest gathering of marketing and advertising professionals in American history, the festival featured the musical artists behind some of today's hottest commercial jingles.


August 15, 1977 -
The Big Ear radio telescope, operated at Ohio State University by the SETI project, receives a strong seventy-two second narrowband radio signal from deep space (6EQUJ5.) The event is named the “Wow! signal” for the notation made by Jerry Ehman, a volunteer on the project.



The signal appears to have come to the northwest of the globular cluster of M55 in the constellation Sagittarius, near the Chi Sagittarii star group. It has never been detected again.


There are a plethora of birthdays today:
I think careful cooking is love, don't you? The loveliest thing you can cook for someone who's close to you is about as nice a valentine as you can give..



It's the 112th birthday of Julia Child - Chef, Spy, Philosopher and in my opinion, one of the greatest Americans of the last century.


Besides Julia's, today is the birthday of Napoleon Bonaparte (1769),




Rose Marie (1925),




Oscar Peterson (1925),




Linda Ellerbee (1944), (possibly the second greatest living American)




Jimmy Webb (1946),




Oh, and my friend Liz

(but she knows how old she is.)



And so it goes.

Well, if I can't take it with me, I'm not goin'.

August 14, 1948-
The Merrie Melodies short, Dough Ray Me-ow, directed by Arthur Davis, was released on this date.



Heathcliff is inspired by the then-popular radio show Duffy's Tavern. The radio program influenced other similar "dopey simpleton"-type characters such as Filligan from Hush My Mouse, Junyer Bear, and Baby Huey from Famous Studios' Noveltoons.


August 14, 1954 -
The clean-cut Canadian quartet, Crew-Cuts (wow, they're really white) topped the charts with their cover of the song, Sh-Boom, on this date.



Their cover of the Chords' Sh-Boom set the pattern, going to number one in 1954 and setting the stage for their other commercially successful pop treatments of R&B hits by the Penguins, Gene and Eunice, Otis Williams and the Charms, the Robins, the Spaniels, the Nutmegs, and others.


August 14, 1954-
The Merrie Melodies short, Stop! Look! And Hasten!, directed by Chuck Jones, and starring Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner, was released on this date.



This cartoon features a unique That's all Folks ending gag, where the Road Runner spells out the text with his smoke trails and it cross-dissolves to the ending background, already completed.


August 14, 1960 -
The Japanese anime Saiyuki, based on the manga by Osamu Tezuka, was released in Japan on this date.



The film is of special note, as it would become one of the first anime films ever to be released in the United States under the title, Alakazam the Greaton July 26, 1961.


August 14, 1965 -
Salvatore Bono and Cherilyn Sarkisian La Pierre captured the #1 spot on the American pop charts with their song I Got You Babe, launching the careers of Sonny and Cher.



Sonny Bono was an up-and-coming record producer when he got Cher a job with Phil Spector as a session singer. They started dating and moved in to their manager's house. Bono would write songs on a piano in the garage. He came up with this tune and wrote the lyrics on a piece of cardboard. Cher didn't like it at first, but Sonny changed the key in the bridge to fit her voice and she loved it.


August 14, 1971 -
The Who released their fifth studio album Who's Next on this date. The albun is widely viewed as one of the greatest rock albums of all time.



It developed from the aborted Lifehouse project, a multi-media rock opera written by the group's Pete Townshend as a follow-up to the band's 1969 album Tommy. The project was cancelled owing to its complexity and to conflicts with Kit Lambert, the band's manager, but Townshend was persuaded the group should record the songs as a straightforward studio album.


August 14, 1974 -
The neo-western, Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia, directed by Sam Peckinpah, and starring Warren Oates, Isela Vega, Robert Webber, Gig Young, Helmut Dantine, Emilio Fernández and Kris Kristofferson. opened in the US on this date.



According to Gordon T. Dawson, principal photography was marked with an overwhelming sense of melancholy and defeat, perhaps engendered by Sam Peckinpah's use of cocaine, introduced to him by Warren Oates.


August 14, 1975 –
Time is Fleeting!

The science fiction comedy horror musical, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, directed by Jim Sharman, and starring Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon, Barry Bostwick, and many of cast members from the original stage productions, opened in the UK, on this date.



When this movie first opened, it had a traditional release, with afternoon and early evening screenings. It bombed. Meat Loaf said he attended an opening week performance with writer and director Jim Sharman in the Midwest, and the theater was empty except for them. Midnight screenings became popular in the mid-1970s, and word of mouth began to spread that the midnight audience might enjoy this movie. It began showing at midnight in a few cities, and became so popular that it has been shown continuously in movie theaters since 1975, making it the longest theatrical run in history.


August 14, 1978 -
The Police released their third single, from their debut album Outlandos d'Amour, Can't Stand Losing You on this date.



For publicity purposes, The Police claimed that this song and Roxanne were banned by the BBC. They weren't, but the story got out and helped boost their credibility with the punk crowd.


August 14, 1987 -
The rom-com film, Can't Buy Me Love, directed by Steve Rash and starring Patrick Dempsey, Amanda Peterson, and Dennis Dugan, opened in the US on this date.



Michael Swerdlick said the idea for the film originated while he was a mailroom clerk at the William Morris Agency. One of the agents invited him and other mailroom staffers to a party on a Saturday night. Swerdlick brought with him a very attractive female friend, and guests took notice. That Monday, he found that his status at the agency improved right away, as "everyone wanted to be my friend," he said. When he decided to write a script about high school, he incorporated this experience into the plot.


August 14, 1991 -
Alan Parker's cult hit The Commitment's, based on Roddy Doyle's novel of the same name, and starring Robert Arkins, Michael Aherne Angeline Ball, Maria Doyle, Dave Finnegan, Bronagh Gallagher, Félim Gormley, Glen Hansard, Dick Massey, Johnny Murphy, Kenneth McCluskey, and Andrew Strong, opened in limited release in the U.S. on this date.



The Corrs, the highly successful Irish band, got their start by auditioning for the film, and they each won small roles. Andrea Corr (lead vocals & tin whistle) plays Jimmy's little sister Sharon. Jim Corr (guitar) is part of the Avant-Garde-A-Clue Band. Caroline Corr (drums) appears in the audience during the performance of I Never Loved A Man. Finally, Sharon Corr (violin) can be seen playing violin with the country & western band that Bernie joins at the end of the film. John Hughes, the film's musical coordinator, became the band's manager.


August 14, 1995 -
The Foo Fighters made their network television debut on The Late Show with David Letterman when they performed their single This Is A Call, on this date.



The single peaked at Number Two on the Modern Rock Track chart, though they wouldn’t have a crossover hit until Big Me in early 1996.


August 14, 2000 -
Dora Márquez and her friend Boots have their first Ayahuasca experience with a map when Nick Jr aired the first episode of Dora the Explorer on this date.



Whenever Swiper manages to steal items from Dora and Boots, he exclaims "You'll never find it now!", but the stolen items are always found and retrieved within a few seconds.


Another unimportant moment in history


Today in History:
August 14, 410 -
Visigoths under King Alaric sacked Rome after slave co-conspirators open the city gates for them on this date.

Looting lasts for six days. (Back in the pre-viagra days, six days of 'looting' was an impressive feat. This may not be the exact date, but you must be impressed when you consider that Visigoth scribes took time out from the orgies to write any date down.)

Barbarians at the Gate indeed.


August 14, 1040 -
Scotland's King Duncan I was killed in a battle against the man who would replace him, Macbeth on this date.

Shakespeare's famous tragedy Macbeth is based upon his life, but is not historically accurate. In the play, Macbeth and his wife murder the aged King Duncan when he comes to visit them in their castle.


August 14, 1900 -
126 years ago today, the western powers quelled the Boxer Rebellion in China. In the clearing stood the Boxers, fighters by their trade, and they carried the reminders of every glove that laid them down or cut them till they cried out, in their anger and their pain, they were leaving, they were leaving, but the fighter still remained.




Unless that was Simon and Garfunkel, in which case the Boxers were bitter, out-of-work Chinese boxers who didn't think the Western powers should be allowed to control China's ports, despite the fact that everyone knew China was a poor, disadvantaged country without any modern conveniences.



Emboldened by the belief that their magical boxing powers made them invulnerable to bullets, they demanded that westerners get out of China or die.

Westerners refused to get out. They crushed the rebellion, and boxing remains a neglected sport in China to this day.


August 14, 1901 -
The first purportedly powered flight, made by Gustave Whitehead in his Number 21 took place in Bridgeport, Connecticut on this date.



Though the flight is accomplished more than two years in advance of the Wright Brothers, it will go largely undocumented, unnoticed, unremarked until long after the Wrights’ globally renowned feat at Kitty Hawk.


August 14, 1904 -
The cattle-herding Hereros, a tribe of Southwest Africa (later Namibia), became the first genocide victims of the 20th century. Queen Victoria's eldest grandson Kaiser Wilhelm II had sent General Lothar von Trotha to put down a Herero uprising along with the groups of rebellious Khoikhoi. Trotha drove the Hereros into the desert and then issued a formal "extermination order" (Schrecklichkeit) authorizing the slaughter of all who refused to surrender.



Out of some 80,000 Hereros, 60,000 died in the desert. Of the 15,000 who surrendered, half of those died in prison camps. Some 9,000 escaped to neighboring countries.

Oh those wacky Germans.


August 14, 1945 -
Emperor Hirohito recorded his unconditional surrender to Allied forces, thus bringing an end to World War II on this date. The Allied forces were so concerned that the emperor would kill himself before the broadcast that they had him pre-record his message.



This broadcast would be the first chance the Japanese people had to hear their god-emperor's speaking voice. Because of the Japanese anathema to surrender and the formal, somewhat archaic Japanese used by the old Imperial Court the emperor spoke, most Japanese didn't realize that they had actually surrendered until about a day later.


August 14, 1945 -
When your hobbies get in the way of your work - that's OK; but when your hobbies get in the way of themselves... well..



Steve Martin, actor, comedian, writer, playwright, producer and banjo player was born on this date.


August 14, 1945 -
Alfred Eisenstaedt shot one of the most iconic images of the 40's on this date - the photographs of a sailor kissing a nurse in Times Square.



In 2007 Houston Police Department forensic artist Lois Gibson completed a detailed investigation and concluded that Glenn McDuffie (80) was the man in the image, which was published on the cover of Life Magazine on August 27.


August 14, 1951 -
...As it must to all men, death came to Charles Foster Kane.



10 years after the fictionalized version of his life premiered, Newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst died at home in Beverly Hills, California, on this date.


August 14, 1967 -
In one of the most famous moment in haircut history, Vidal Sassoon flew in from London to give Mia Farrow her pixie cut for Roman Polanski‘s big movie, Rosemary’s Baby, reportedly costing $5,000.

In reality, just a publicity stunt, Farrow had previously cut her own hair.


August 14, 1972 -
The only difference between the Democrats and the Republicans is that the Democrats allow the poor to be corrupt, too.





Oscar Levant, Pharmaceutical spokesperson, pianist, composer, author, comedian, and actor, died on this date.


August 14, 1995 -
Shannon Faulkner officially became the first female cadet in the history of The Citadel, South Carolina's state military college.



She quit the school less than a week later, citing the stress of her court fight, and her isolation among the male cadets.


August 14, 2003 -
A widespread blackout (lasting almost two days for some), affecting approximately 45 million people in the eastern United States and ten million in Ontario, Canada, occurred on this date.



The final conclusion of the investigation into the incident revealed that the blackout began when a generating plant in Eastlake, Ohio went offline amid high electrical demand. It was the second largest blackout in world history next to the 1999 blackout in Brazil.


August 14, 2126 -
In 1973, astronomer Brian Marsden, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, calculated that the next scheduled perihelion (the point nearest the sun in the orbit of a celestial body) for the "Doomsday Rock," also known as the Swift-Tuttle Comet, would occur on this date. The six-mile-diameter mass is thought to be roughly the same size as the asteroid which wiped out the dinosaurs.

Marsden has continued to refine his numbers. Currently, his new calculations show Comet Swift-Tuttle will actually pass a comfortable 15 million miles from Earth on its next trip to the inner solar system in 2126. However, when Marsden ran his orbital calculations further into the future, he found that, in 3044, Comet Swift-Tuttle may pass within a million miles of Earth, a true cosmic ``near miss.''

Plan accordingly.


Before you go - if this is meaningful to you,



Autumn is in 40 days.



And Christmas is but 133 days away



And so it goes.

When nothing goes right... go left

Today is International Lefthanders Day.



The U.S. has had eight left-handed presidents; James Garfield, Herbert Hoover, Harry Truman, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.


August 13, 1932 -
The Looney Tunes short, Bosko's Store, directed by Hugh Harmanand Rudolf Ising, and starring Bosko, was released on this date.



This cartoon entered the public domain in 1961 as Sunset Productions did not renew the copyright in time.


August 13, 1938-
The Merrie Melodies short, The Major Lied 'Til Dawn, directed by Frank Tashlin, and starring was released on this date.



This cartoon seldom airs on American television because of several scenes involving stereotypical African natives.


August 13, 1942 -
Walt Disney's Bambi premiered at Radio City Music Hall in New York on this date.



(The film proper begins about 7 minute in)

Unusual for the time, Walt Disney insisted on children providing the voices for the animals when they were young, instead of using adults mimicking youngsters.


August 13, 1947 -
The apex of technicolor film-making - Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's Black Narcissus, premiered in New York City on this date.



Director of Photography Jack Cardiff drew inspiration for his shots from the great painters; he experimented with the tones of Van Gogh, for example, or the reds and greens from Rembrandt.


August 13, 1949 -
The Looney Tunes short, Often an Orphan, directed by Chuck Jones, and starring Porky Pig and Charlie Dog, was released on this date.



This is the third and final time Charlie Dog and Porky Pig are paired together; Charlie's two final shorts have him pursue others to be his master


August 13, 1963 -
The British drama, Lord of the Flies, directed by Peter Brook, based on the 1954 novel by William Golding, and starring James Aubrey, Tom Chapin, Hugh Edwards, Tom Gaman, David Surtees, Simon Surtees, and Nicholas Hammond, opened in the US on thsi date.



The finished movie was given an X certificate by the British Board of Film Censors; none of the boys who'd appeared in it could see it in a theater on its first release.


August 13, 1966 -
Napoleon XIV's goofy breakup song They're Coming To Take Me Away, Ha-haaa peaks at #3 on Billboard's Hot 100 on this date. It quickly drops to the bottom of the Top 40, however, as several radio stations ban the tune, fearing its lyrics might be interpreted as being insensitive to the mentally ill.



When this novelty song became a surprise hit, the record company sent other people to perform it at live appearances while Jerry Samuels, a recording engineer from New York City, kept working at his day job.

(An interesting bit of trivia, at least to me,) Once a song was released, it fell into the realm of compulsory licensing, which means anyone could record it if they pay the statutory royalty rate. Since this has no discernable melody, the producers were able to copyright it as a lecture intended for oral delivery instead of as a song. This meant other record companies couldn't copy it without permission.


August 13, 1967 -
One of the defining movies of the 1960s, Bonnie and Clyde, starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway, had its US premiere on this date.



When Warren Beatty was on-board as producer only, his sister Shirley MacLaine was a strong possibility to play Bonnie. But when Beatty decided to play Clyde himself, for obvious reasons he decided not to use MacLaine.


August 13, 1976 -
AIP released the sci-fi film Futureworld, starring Peter Fonda, Blythe Danner, Arthur Hill and Yul Brynner, on this date.



This film was the first film sold to China for a large-scale release after President Jimmy Carter formalized relations with the country.


August 13, 1997 –
Trey Parker and Matt Stone decide to become millionaires many times over when their program South Park premiered for the first time on Comedy Central on this date.



To date, South Park still holds the Guiness World Record for "Most Swearing in animated series."


August 13, 2012 –
Taylor Swift released the first single, from her fourth studio album, Red, We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together, on this date.



The song was written by the singer with the Swedish hitmaking duo of Shellback and Max Martin. Taylor told fans worldwide in a webchat on August 13, 2012 that the scornful yet fun song is about one of her former beaus and is what she refers to, in jest, as "a really romantic song... touching and sensitive… to my lovely ex-boyfriend." When asked whom the tune is about, she replied with a smile, "I'm trying not to be too cryptic with it, but I'm trying not to give it all away." My daughters, ardent Swifties tell me the song's subject is the actor Jake Gyllenhaal, who dated Swift in late 2010 and early 2011.


Another little known Monopoly card


Today in History:
August 13, 1521 -
After a 75 day siege, Hernando Cortes captured and destroyed the capital of the Aztec Empire, Tenochtitlan (Aztec for "Mexico City") on this date.



When the Spaniards fail to discover Montezuma's treasure, they tortured Cuauhtemoc (the current Aztec king) by pouring hot oil over his feet. The emperor responds by asking, "Am I on a bed of roses?" (Who knew the Aztecs were such comedians?)

It was important to defeat the Aztecs, because they were an Evil Empire that practiced Human Sacrifice and Difficult Spelling.


August 13, 1899 -
The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder..



Arguably, the most famous film director in the 20th Century, Alfred Hitchcock was born on this date. Hitchcock, known as the master of suspense, is most renowned for his films Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest and Psycho.



August 13, 1907 -
The first (gasoline powered) taxicabs, the New York Taxicab Company fleet, appeared on NYC streets on this date (the actual date seems to be mired in controversy.) The first 65 taxis were imported from France by businessman Harry N. Allen, who adapted the French word taxi-mètre and coined the word "taxicab" to describe the vehicles he was importing.

In time, the shortened term "taxi" came into common usage. (The first gas powered cabs were red and green. Allen was also the first person to paint his taxis yellow, after learning that yellow is the color most easily seen from a distance.)


August 13, 1918 -
Women were first allowed to enlist in the United States Marine Corps on this date.

Opha Mae Johnson was the first of 305 women to enlist in the US Marine Corps on this day.


August 13, 1926 -
Minor league Rat Bastard (depending on your point of view) Fidel Castro was born on his father's 23,000-acre sugar cane plantation near Biran, Cuba on this date.

I wonder if Castro has gotten that chance to play ball in the Major Leagues in the after life?


August 13, 1960 -
NASA launched the balloon satellite Echo 1 from Cape Canaveral Florida, using a Thor-Delta rocket, on this date.



Later that day, when Echo 1 was in range, the first satellite message was sent From Florida to Bell Labs in New Jersey.


August 13, 1961-
The city of Berlin split itself right down the middle on this date.

The Cold War was running pretty hot back then. The Russians were just nasty. They were so evil they convinced East Germany to shut West Germany out. East Germany locked the Brandenburg gate and threw away the key. Then, just to be absolutely safe, they built the Great Wall of Berlin, and assigned evil socialist soldiers to shoot any West Germans who tried to sneak into East Germany.



Oddly enough, no West Germans tried to sneak in.

The soldiers, being evil socialist bastards with guns and therefore needing desperately to shoot at someone, shot at East Germans instead.

About a year later, for example, on August 17, 1962, 18-year-old Peter Fechter was shot by East German guards as he tried to cross the Berlin Wall into West Germany. He bled to death in public view.



The guards (Rolf Friedrich and Erich Schreiber) who shot him were tracked down and convicted of manslaughter thirty-four years later.

Moral: You might think you can get away with shooting people just because you're a heavily armed socialist bastard living in an evil socialist regime propped up by an evil socialist empire. You can run. But you can't hide. (It may seem like you can, but just wait.)

Eventually John F. Kennedy announced that he was a jelly-filled donut. At least that's what some people thought he said.

Ronald Reagan asked Mr. Gorbachev to tear down this wall,

Boris Yeltsin rode on a tank,

and there didn't seem to be any real point in having a Wall any more.

So they tore it down. (Karma does appear to bite one in the ass.)


August 13, 1969 -
The Apollo 11 astronauts, Neil A. Armstrong, Lt. Col. Michael Collins, and Col. Buzz Aldrin, were released from their three-week quarantine and are given a ticker-tape parade in New York.



It would be a hectic day for the astronauts. After the three and a half hour ticker-tape parade in NYC, the trio went on to Chicago for another parade. Their day ended with a state dinner hosted by President Richard Nixon in Los Angeles, where they were awarded them the Presidential Medal of Freedom.


August 13, 1990 -
While warming up for an outdoor concert at Wingate Field in Flatbush, Brooklyn on this date, Curtis Mayfield was paralyzed when a lighting tower falls from the stage and onto his back.



Despite this, he continued his career as a recording artist, releasing his final album New World Order in 1996.


August 13th, 2008 -
Michael Phelps won his 11th career gold medal on this date. With 11 gold medals, Phelps had officially won more gold medals than any other Olympic athlete in history. Between the 2004 Athens Olympics and the 2016 Rio Olympics, Phelps has 28 medals in total - 23 of them gold medals, more than double the count of his nearest rivals.



Surprisingly, Phelps’ 11th overall gold medal would not be his greatest accomplishment at the 2008 Olympic Games. By the end of the Beijing Games, Phelps had won a total of 8 gold medals, which broke the previous record of seven held by Mark Spitz. When asked about his accomplishment, Phelps shared, “Records are always made to be broken no matter what they are.”



And so it goes.