Sometimes wishes shouldn't come true

In 1923, 22-year-old Irish jockey Frank Hayes won his first race – the steeplechase at New York’s Belmont Park. Sadly, it also proved to be his last race, as Frank suffered a fatal heart attack towards the end of it.



Despite his sudden death, Frank’s body remained in the saddle while his horse, a 20-to-1 underdog named Sweet Kiss, jumped the final fence and crossed the finish line, winning by a head. This earned Frank the rather unfortunate distinction of being the world’s first deceased jockey to win a race.

Perhaps he should have choosen a different profession.


September 7, 1935 -
The Looney Tunes short, Porky's Moving Day, directed by Jack King and starring Porky Pig, was released on this date.



This is Jack King's final cartoon before returning to Disney.


September 7, 1939 -
The Looney Tunes short, Naughty Neighbors, directed by Bob Clampett and starring Porky Pig and Petunia Pig, was released on this date.



This is the final appearance of Petunia Pig in the Golden Age of American Animation.


September 7, 1939 -
The Merrie Melodies short, The Little Lion Hunter, directed by Chuck Jones and starring Inki, was released on this date.



Like the other Inki cartoons, this short has been It is rarely shown today from television and modern home video due to heavy African stereotyping


September 7, 1949 -
The Merrie Melodies short, Frigid Hare, directed by Chuck Jones and starring Bugs Bunny, was released on this date.



This short reverses the common mistake shown in polar settings. There are no known indigenous people at the South Pole, although there are many varieties of penguins. Similarly, penguins are often shown in Arctic settings, despite the fact they live in the Southern Hemisphere.


October 7, 1950 -
The character of Granny appeared for the first time in a Looney Tunes Cartoon when Canary Row, directed by Friz Freleng and starring Sylvester and Tweety, premiered on this date.



Mel Blanc's voice for Tweety, except when singing, was edited to an extra higher pitch than usual for this cartoon, but would go back to its regular edited pitch in Tweety's next short, Putty Tat Trouble.


October 7, 1952 -
A little TV show called American Bandstand premiered on this date.



It premiered locally as a live show, Bandstand, on Philadelphia television station WFIL-TV (Channel 6, now WPVI-TV) on this date in Studio 'B', which was located in their just-completed addition to the original 1947 building (4548 Market Street) and was hosted by Bob Horn, with Lee Stewart as co-host. Dick Clark did not become associated with the show until 1956.


October 7, 1957 –
The first movie to be adapted to become a TV series, How to Marry a Millionaire, starring Lori Nelson, Merry Anders, and Barbara Eden premiered on this date. It was syndicated and not on a regular network.



A moderate success during its initial run, the show was renewed to return for an abbreviated second season but did so without Lori Nelson, who quit in a huff. Greta was said to have married a gas station owner and moved to California, and Lisa Gaye joined the cast as Gwen Kirby.


October 7, 1959 -
The 50s most glamorous and wholesome stars - Rock Hudson and Doris Day, starred in their first pairing, Pillow Talk, which went into general release on this date.



Ross Hunter wrote that after he made this film, no theatre managers wanted to book it. Popular movie themes at the time were war films, westerns, or spectacles. Hunter was told by the big movie chains that sophisticated comedies like Pillow Talk went out with William Powell. They also believed that Doris Day and Rock Hudson were things of the past and had been overtaken by newer stars. Hunter persuaded Sol Schwartz, who owned the Palace Theatre in New York, to book the film for a two-week run, and it was a smash hit. The public had been starved for romantic comedy, and theatre owners who had previously turned down Ross Hunter now had to deal with him on HIS terms.


October 7, 1960 -

Route 66 starring Martin Milner and George Maharis premiered on CBS TV, on this date.



The series' writers travelled around the U.S. looking for locations, about which to write episodes. Every episode was filmed on-location.


October 7, 1964 -
The Beatles appear on episode of ABC-TV's Shindig, (filmed on October 3rd in London, in front of the adoring Beatles Fan Club,) on this date.



The Beatles were at the top of the bill on the show; the other acts were Sandie Shaw, PJ Proby, The Karl Denver Trio, Tommy Quickly, Sounds Incorporated, and Lyn Cornell. The Beatles performed three songs live: Kansas City/Hey-Hey-Hey-Hey!, I’m A Loser and Boys. In addition to their performance, The Beatles also appeared in the show’s finale with the Karl Denver Trio.


October 7, 1971 -
William Friedkin's taut policier, The French Connection, opened in NYC on this date.



The car chase was filmed without obtaining the proper permits from the city. Members of the NYPD's tactical force helped control traffic. But most of the control was achieved by the assistant directors with the help of off-duty NYPD officers, many of whom had been involved in the actual case. The assistant directors, under the supervision of Terence A. Donnelly, cleared traffic for approximately five blocks in each direction. Permission was given to literally control the traffic signals on those streets where they ran the chase car. Even so, in many instances, they illegally continued the chase into sections with no traffic control, where they actually had to evade real traffic and pedestrians. Many of the (near) collisions in the movie were therefore real and not planned (with the exception of the near-miss of the lady with the baby carriage, which was carefully rehearsed).


October 7, 1979 -
Factory Records released Transmission, the debut single (the 7" disc version) by seminal post-punk band Joy Division, on this date.



In May 2007, NME magazine placed Transmission at No.20 in its list of the 50 "Greatest Indie Anthems Ever", one place below their third single Love Will Tear Us Apart .


October 7, 1989 –
Janet Jackson's single, Miss You Much, one of seven Top 5 singles from the album Rhythm Nation 1814, topped the charts on this date.



This song was written by the production duo Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. They had a lot of success on Jackson's previous album, Control, in 1986 - the breakthrough album that helped Jackson break the pop mold and become a sex icon with a funky edge.


October 7, 1995 -
Alanis Morissette's third album, Jagged Little Pill reaches the top of the Billboard albums chart on this date. It became one of the best-selling albums of all time and made Morissette the first Canadian to achieve double diamond sales.



Morissette is the fourth female artist to have a debut album reach #1 in the 1990s, following Paula Abdul, Mariah Carey and Toni Braxton.


Another little known Monopoly card


Today in History:
October 7, 1492 -
Because of a flock of seagulls (I kid you not,) Columbus changed course to the southwest, on this date.



As a result he missed discovering Florida, leaving it for Fountain of Wayne (I mean Youth) groupie, Ponce de León, to discover.

Imagine the mess we'd be in if he didn't change course.


October 7, 1849 -
On this date, Edgar Allan Poe was found in a delirious state (Maryland) outside a Baltimore voting place (saloon).



Mr. Poe was often found delirious, especially outside voting places,



but this time his delirium was serious and he died.


October 7, 1952 -
It's Vladimir Putin's 74th birthday.



All I'm going to say is he should live and enjoy his upcoming retirement.


October 7, 1955 -
It was on this day in San Francisco at the Six Gallery, the poet Allen Ginsberg read his poem Howl for the first time.



The poem begins, "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness." His friend Jack Kerouac sat on the edge of the stage and when Ginsberg was done, the audience exploded in applause.



When Lawrence Ferlinghetti published the poem Howl out of his City Lights bookstore in San Francisco, he was arrested and tried for obscenity, but he was found not guilty.


October 7, 1959 -

... There is no dark side of the moon really. Matter of fact it's all dark.



The dark far side of the Moon was photographed for the first time and pictures relayed back to Earth by Russia's Luna 3 spacecraft. After passing the Moon, the Luna 3 looked back from a distance of 63,500 km to take 29 photos of the sunlit far side of the Moon.



The photos, taken over a period of 40 minutes, were developed onboard and radioed back to Earth on October 18, 1959. They covered 70% of the far side. While the resolution of the photographs was very low resolution, many of the features of the Moon could be recognized.


October 7, 1964 -
Walter W. Jenkins, chief White House aide and longtime friend of President Lyndon B. Johnson, was arrested for disorderly conduct two blocks from the White House on this date. Jenkins was discovered in a YMCA pay toilet with another man.

Ultimately, Jenkins is forced to resign, so as not to jeopardize Johnson's re-election campaign. Jenkins stated that during his arrest, his mind had been "befuddled by fatigue, alcohol, physical illness, and lack of food."

Yeah, that's it, befuddled by fatigue... yeah, that and a wide stance will get you in trouble in a men's public restroom ever time.


October 7, 1968 -
The Motion Picture Association of America announced a new voluntary Hollywood rating system, on this date, giving advance warnings to parents so they can make decisions about which films might be appropriate for their children.

The four MPAA ratings included ‘G’ for general audiences of all ages, ‘M’ for mature audiences, ‘R’ for restricted under the age of 16, unless accompanied by an adult, and ‘X’, which the National Association of Theater Owners lobbied for in order to protect itself against lawsuits.


October 7, 1968 -
Jose Feliciano caused an uproar when he does a slow, jazzy version of the National Anthem before Game 5 of the World Series between the Tigers and Cardinals, on this date. Afterwards, a Tigers official told him the club's phones were lighting up with angry calls from around the country: "Some veterans were taking off their shoes and throwing them at their television screens," he was told.



Among those joining the outrage were Tigers starting pitcher Mickey Lolich, who complains that the overly long rendition screwed up his pregame routine. As a result of his cover of the national anthem, many radio stations refused to play his songs, and his career suffered.


October 7, 2001 -
The US launched Operation Enduring Freedom, hunting for the terrorist in Afghanistan, that brought down the World Trade Center Towers. On December 31, 2014, Operation Enduring Freedom - Afghanistan concluded, and was succeeded by Operation Freedom's Sentinel on January 1, 2015. The Dept. of Defense was expected to formally end Operation Enduring Freedom on August 31, 2021, but concluded with the final withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan on August 30.



Please take a moment out of your day today to consider the sacrifices, warranted or not, that the men and woman of the US military (and their families) have made.


October 7, 2011 -
The world’s largest chocolate bar was made by Thorntons Limited in Alfreton, Derbyshire, England on this date. The giant bar was smashed up, using axes, and samples were given to Thornton employees at the event. The rest was sold in stores to raise money for charity. (Sorry you weren't there to sample it.)



It measured 4.0 m (13 ft 1.48 in) by 4.0 m (13 ft 1.48 in) by 0.35 m (1 ft 1.78 in) and weighed 5,792 kilograms (nearly six tons). The ingredients were sugar, dried whole milk powder, cocoa butter, cocoa mass, butter oil, emulsifier. (This will be on the test.)


October 27, 2023 -
Hamas and several other Palestinian nationalist militant groups launched coordinated armed incursions from the Gaza Strip into the Gaza Envelope of southern Israel, the first invasion of Israeli territory since the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The attack coincided with the Jewish religious holiday Simchat Torah.



The attacks initiated the ongoing Israel–Hamas war. Please take another moment out of your day to remember all of the victims of this conflict and hope that a ceasefire plan has been found and the remaining hostages are on their way home.


And so it goes

But I'll tell you a secret. All the best people are

Today is Mad Hatter's Day. The Mad Hatter wore a top hat on the front of which a slip of paper with reads "10/6." The 10/6 refers to the cost of a hat — 10 shillings and 6 pence, and later became the date and month to celebrate Mad Hatter Day. (Except since the Mad Hatter lived in England, 10/6 might refer to June 10th - but I'm not going there.)



The idiom “mad as a hatter” was around long before Carroll started writing. Colloquially used to describe an eccentric person, “mad as a hatter” is based on a problem that arose in the 1800s when hat companies used lead in the hat-making process. The lead got into their systems and they went insane, hence the term “mad as a hatter”.


October 6, 1927 -
Good, bad or indifferent to it, The Jazz Singer (the first feature-length movie with audible synchronized dialogue), premiered in NYC on this date.



Al Jolson's famous line (as Jack Robin) "You ain't heard nothin' yet." was an ad-lib. The intention was that the film should only have synchronized music, not speech, but Jolson dropped in the line (which he used in his stage act) after the song Dirty Hands, Dirty Face. The director wisely left it in.


October 6, 1951 -
The Merrie Melodies short, Ballot Box Bunny, directed by Friz Freleng, and starring Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam, was released on this date.



The original cartoon finished with Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam playing a game of Russian roulette after they find out they both lost the election. This has been edited in most broadcasts.


October 6, 1960 -
Stanley Kubrick's gladiator spectacular, Spartacus, starring Kirk Douglas, Laurence Olivier, Peter Ustinov, John Gavin, Jean Simmons, Charles Laughton, and Tony Curtis, premiered in New York City on this date.



Peter Ustinov joked about his daughter, born at the beginning of production, being in kindergarten by the time this movie was finished. When asked what her father did for a living, she would answer, "Spartacus".


October 6, 1963 -
The wonderful adaption of the classic 18th Century novel, Tom Jones premiered in NYC on this date. (Bizarre piece of trivia: this was the last film that John F. Kennedy saw before his assassination.)



It took three hours to shoot the famous eating scene, in which Tom Jones and Mrs. Waters express their lust for each other by tearing into a huge feast. Buckets were conveniently placed out of camera range to accommodate the actors, who kept throwing up from all the eating.


October 6, 1963 -
“She was holding my hand and I thought, ‘Gee, she seems nervous.’ At that time, I wasn’t nervous. I was still very young, I think, about to do ‘Funny Girl,’ and now, when I think back on it, I think, ‘Oh, my God, I know exactly what she’s feeling.’ Or, you know, the fears. It’s like, as you get older and people are kind of looking for you to fail more, I think—not people, not the audience—but, you know, critics or producers or whatever. And I just felt her. I felt her anxiety. . . .”



Barbra Streisand appeared on The Judy Garland Show on this date and performed one of the most iconic duets in TV history.


October 6, 1965 -
The Supremes single I Hear a Symphony went to No. 1 on this date.



You won't hear a full symphony orchestra in this song, but there is a prominent string section, arranged by Paul Riser, that implies it. Otherwise, the instrumentation is more typical, with a saxophone section and piano (played by Funk Brother Earl Van Dyke). The song evokes classical music in its structure though, building throughout to a kind of crescendo


0ctober 6, 1966 -
The Star Trek episode The Enemy Within, first ared on this date.

In it, a transporter mishap divides Captain Kirk into two versions of himself, one good and one evil, but neither is able to function separately for long.



The episode marks the first use of the line, “He’s dead, Jim.”


October 6, 1967 -

Kirk, Scott, McCoy and Uhura enter a parallel universe in the Star Trek episode Mirror, Mirror, which aired on this date. (Look for Spocks' outrageous Van Dyke beard in this episode.)



It took about a month to complete this particular episode. After filming had begun, BarBara Luna was diagnosed with strep throat. Since the script called for Capt. Kirk to kiss her, they had to postpone the kissing scene for three weeks until she was medically cleared, since they couldn't risk William Shatner getting infected. (I'm sure Bill would have risked it.)


October 6, 1969 -
The Beatles release a double A-side single Something and Come Together on this date. It was the only song written by George Harrison released as a single by The Beatles.



George Harrison wrote this during a break while The Beatles were working on The White Album. It was not recorded in time for the album, so Harrison gave the song to Joe Cocker, but Cocker didn't release it until late in 1969 on his second album, Joe Cocker!, which came out about a month after The Beatles issued it on Abbey Road.



John Lennon was sued for stealing the guitar riff and the line "Here comes old flat-top" from Chuck Berry's You Can't Catch Me. The lawsuit did not come from Berry, but from Morris Levy, one of the music industry's most infamous characters. He owned the song along with thousands of other early rock songs that he obtained from many poor, black, and unrepresented artists. Levy sued the Beatles, or more accurately, John Lennon, over the song around the time the Beatles broke up.

For years, Lennon delayed the trial while he and the Beatles tried to sort out all the legal and business problems that plagued Apple Records. Finally, in an attempt to avoid the court room as much as he could (Lennon felt like he was appearing in court more often than not), he settled with Levy. Lennon agreed to record his Rock N Roll album, which was just a series of cover songs, including three songs Levy owned (including You Can't Catch Me) on the tracklist.


October 6, 1973 –
Cher's single, Half-Breed, went to No. 1 on the Billboard Charts on this date. (Sorry for the earworm.)



Snuff Garrett produced the song despite his intention to quit working with Sonny and Cher. He had been battling Sonny, the singer's then-husband, over what type of material she should be singing. Lyricist Mary Dean wasn't aware of the conflict when she brought Half-Breed to Garrett, a song she wrote with Al Capps specifically for Cher. By the time this hit #1, Sonny & Cher's recording career as a duo had hit the skids with their last single, Mama Was A Rock and Roll Singer, petering out at #77. Their marriage wasn't performing much better; they divorced in 1975.


October 6, 1976 -
The song, Disco Duck by Rick Dees and His Cast of Idiots received a gold record on this date. The song was featured in the movie Saturday Night Fever but was not included on its soundtrack album.



According to Dees, the voice of the duck was provided by a guy he met at the gym who could pull it off. This was Kenneth Pruitt, who sued Dees after the song became a hit, claiming he was paid just $188 for his services, which included dressing up in a duck suit to promote the song on various TV appearances and on a walk through Times Square in New York City. It's likely that the suit was settled and Pruitt ordered to keep quiet - he has not been heard from.


October 6, 1978 -
Alan Parker's harrowing drama, Midnight Express starring Brad Davis, Randy Quaid and John Hurt, premiered in the US on this date.



Although the movie is based on a true story, it has been indicated by Billy Hayes twenty years after its release, that what is presented in the movie is a very exaggerated version of what happened to him in the prison in Istanbul, Turkey.


October 6, 1992 -
34 years ago, R.E.M. released their eighth studio album, Automatic for the People, on this date.



The album title was inspired by Weaver D's soul food diner in Athens, Georgia. When you ordered food there, they answered by saying "automatic." They had a sign that said "Delicious Fine Foods - Automatic For The People."


Today's moment of Zen.


Today in History:
Today is Armed Forces Day in Egypt (we'll get back to Armed Forces Day in a moment but it's not in celebration of the Elvis Costello album) and Ivy Day in Ireland. (Ivy Day is not a horticultural celebration. The date marks the anniversary of the 1891 death of Irish nationalist Charles Stewart Parnell;



Irish favoring home rule traditionally pin a bit of ivy to their lapels in his honor.

Ivy Day should not be confused with I.V. Day, celebrated only by drips.)


Aeschylus was the first Greek playwright to produce tragedies as we would know them today, but that's not important to our story today.



According to legend, Aeschylus died when an eagle, mistaking his bald head for a stone, dropped a tortoise on it, killing him instantly on this date in 456 BC (that was tragedy for Aeschylus but it's comedy to us.)


October 6, 105 BC –
Speaking of The Roman Empire (which I have a reason to - I write about history) - The battle of Arausio, occurred on this date. Migratory tribes of Cimbri (possibly a Celtic people but origin uncertain) led by Boiorix and Teutoni win a decisive victory against two Roman armies outside Arausio (now Orange in southeastern France) near the Rhone River.



The two inexperienced Roman commanders – proconsul Quintus Servilius Caepio, a noble, refuses to serve under the higher-ranked consul Gnaeus Mallius Maximus because he is a ‘new man’ – are so much at odds that Caepio launches an inept assault on the Cimbrian camp while Maximus is negotiating with Boiorix – causing virtually all the Romans and large numbers of their allied troops, servants and camp followers to be lost, one of the worst defeats in Roman history.

So I actually had a reason to think about it.


October 6, 1014 -
Czar Samuil of Bulgaria died of a heart attach after an army of 15,000 of his men returned, blinded by his enemy Emperor Basil of the Byzantine Empire. One out of every hundred of his men was permitted to keep one eye, such that they were able to return home.

For this victory Basil earned the title Bulgaroctonus, slayer of Bulgars.

I guess we shouldn't complain.


October 6 is the anniversary of one of the greatest moments in the history of literary criticism. It was on that date in 1536 that William Tyndale was recognized for his important contribution to world literature, the first translation of the New Testament into English - by being tied to the stake, strangled, and his dead body then burnt.



Ah, when men were men, women were women, and critics were murderous, torch-wielding fanatics!


October 6, 1956 -
Albert Sabin announced that his oral polio vaccine was ready for testing, on this date. With the menace of polio growing, complicated by the fact that there were 3 different strains of the crippling disease, Jonas Salk developed a vaccine given by injection, but it was only effective in preventing complications of polio, and did not prevent the initial infection.



By carrying out autopsies of polio victims, Sabin was able to demonstrate that the poliovirus multiplied and attacked the intestines before it moved to the central nervous system. He developed an oral vaccine, to be put onto sugar cubes that stimulated antibody production.


October 6, 1961 -
President John F. Kennedy advised American families to build bomb shelters to protect them from atomic fallout in the event of a nuclear war, on this date.



In raising Cold War civil defense issues, Kennedy said the government would soon begin providing such protection for every American.



Many Americans did prepare for nuclear war by buying up canned goods and building backyard bomb shelters. Also at the time many home builders offered a bomb shelter as part of new home packages.


October 6, 1966 -
LSD was declared illegal in the US on this date.



Hopefully you timed your intake accordingly.


October 6, 1973 -
In a surprise attack on the Jewish highest holiday of Yom Kippur - Syrian and Egyptian armies invaded Israel on this date, starting, what became known as, the Yom Kippur War. The US came to Israel's aid, but as Israel began winning the war, Israel wouldn't back down from the siege brought on by the Egyptian troops to the south.



The Soviet Union threatened to intervene on Egypt's behalf, causing high tensions between the US and Soviet Union that caused lasting damage to the relationship between two. Eventually, all parties came to a peace agreement.


October 6, 1976 -
During a televised debate on this date, President and candidate Gerald Ford asserts that there was 'no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe'.



Ford lost the election. (I believe the previous White House was trying to use the corollary, 'there was no Russian collusion in the election', from his playbook.)


October 6, 1981 -
During Armed Forces Day (commemorating Egypt's participation in the Arab-Israeli War,) armed gunmen leapt from a truck and began shooting into the reviewing stand at Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.



The assassination had been approved by Omar Abdel-Rahman, a cleric later convicted in the US for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.


October 6, 2007 -
Jason Lewis completed the first human-powered circumnavigation of the globe. Using a pedal boat, roller blades, bicycles, kayak, and his feet, the adventurer and sustainability campaigner finished the harrowing journey in a little over 13 years.



in the process of completing his ‘Expedition 360’, Lewis also became the first person to cross North America on inline skates, and the first to cross the Pacific Ocean by pedal power. Together with Stevie Smith, Lewis completed the first crossing of the Atlantic Ocean from mainland Europe to North America by human power. He successfully ended his 4,833-day expedition, having travelled 46,505 miles (74,842 km)


Before you go - whether or not you want to acknowledge this - the start of Hanukkah begins in 59 days -



and Christmas begin in 80 days!



Bunkies, try to do something to get off the naughty list! Or hope that Hanukkah Harry will come through with the gifts.



And so it goes

Every burned book enlightens the world

This year the first week of October has been designated as Banned Book Week! This years theme is "Let Books Be. Protect the Freedom to Read".



If you are ever in need of something to read, banned book lists can be a great resource.


Since it is the first Monday in October, it's the start of the 2026-2027 Supreme Court Term -



I'm sure nothing much will be going on.


October 5, 1946 -
The Looney Tunes short, The Big Snooze, directed by Bob Clampett, and starring Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd, was released on this date.



As Bugs is pleading with Elmer not to quit, he turns to the audience and comments, "'Bette Davis is gonna hate me for this." Davis, at the time, was going through a well-publicized legal battle with Warner Bros. trying to get out of her contract.


October 5, 1947 -
The first televised White House address was given by President Harry S. Truman on this date.



He spoke about food conservation to aid post-war Europe, which was still recovering from World War II and suffering from famine. In particular, he recommended that Americans cut back on their use of grain in order to help starving Europeans.


October 5, 1950 -
You Bet Your Life, hosted by Groucho Marx with his announcer George Fenneman, premiered on NBC-TV on this date. Its' run lasted 11 years.



Not to creep you out but every single person in that audience is dead yet you've hear them your entire life - most of the canned laughter used on TV shows came from old You Bet Your Life Shows. So it's literally - I hear dead people.


October 5, 1956 -
The huge, hulking, biblical spectacular, The Ten Commandments (the last film directed by the master showman, Cecil B Demille) opened on this date.



Producer and director Cecil B. DeMille suffered a heart attack during the production, after climbing 130 feet to check a faulty camera perched on one of the giant gates used during the exodus sequence. He took two days off, then returned to work, against his doctor's orders, to complete this movie.


October 5, 1961 -
Blake Edwards' adaptation of Truman Capote's novel, Breakfast at Tiffany's, premiered at Radio City Music Hall in New York City on this date.



Holly Golightly wears the same dresses all the way through the movie, simply changing the accessories to give each outfit a different look. Her black shift dress features through the movie at least four times.


October 5, 1962 -
Parlophone Records released the Beatles first single, Love Me Do, in England on this date. (The B side was, P.S., I Love You.)



Despite their UK success, the group had a lot of trouble getting attention in America. Parlophone's US counterpart, Capitol Records, wouldn't release Love Me Do, figuring it would flop. It ended up getting American distribution on the smaller Tollie label, but not until April 27, 1964 during the height of Beatlemania. It rose to #1 on May 30, giving the group their fourth US #1 hit.


October 5, 1969 -

The British Empire had been on a long slow decline for many years. The last flourish of that dying world power happened on this date - Monty Python's Flying Circus made its debut on BBC-TV.



The Pythons did almost all of their own stunts, including Graham Chapman (a qualified mountaineer) reading a sketch while hanging upside-down on a rope, and Michael Palin plummetting fifteen feet into a canal in "The Fish-Slapping Dance" after John Cleese smacked him in the head with a trout.


October 5, 1973 -
The seventh studio album by Elton John, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, (a double LP,) was release on this date.





Elton and his songwriting partner Bernie Taupin went to Jamaica to record the album, but the studio wasn't up to standard, so the project was abandoned there with only a rough version of Saturday Night's Alright (For Fighting) actually being recorded. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and the rest of the album were recorded in France at Strawberry Studios (The Chateau d'Hierouville).


October 5, 1990 -
Henry and June, the first NC-17-rated film was released in the US on this date.



Fred Ward replaced Alec Baldwin as Henry Miller. Baldwin had been originally cast but pulled out about two weeks prior to filming.


October 5, 1991 –
Marky Mark & the Funky Bunch's (featuring Loleatta Holloway) single, Good Vibrations, went to No. 1 on the Billboard Charts on this date.



This samples Love Sensation, a 1980 song by the disco singer Loleatta Holloway, who sings on this with Marky Mark. Dan Hartman received royalties from Good Vibrations because he wrote Love Sensation. Hartman had a hit in 1984 with I Can Dream About You. He died of a brain tumor in 1994. Love Sensation was also sampled in 1991 by Black Box for their song Ride On Time.


October 5, 2000 -
America was introduced to the inhabitants of Stars Hollow, Connecticut, when the WB premiered the Gilmore Girls on this date.



Scott Patterson, who plays Luke, was not originally hired to be a series regular. He was only signed on for the pilot episode, but it was only after the discovery of the undeniable chemistry between he and Lauren Graham that he was contracted for more episodes, and quickly became a series regular.


Word of the Day


Today in History:
October 5, 1877 -
... I am tired of fighting. Our chiefs are killed; Looking-glass is dead. Too-hul-hul-suit is dead. The old men are all dead. It is the young men, now, who say ’yes’ or ’no’[that is, vote in council]. He who led on the young men [Joseph’s brother, Ollicut] is dead. It is cold, and we have no blankets. The little children are freezing to death. My people--some of them--have run away to the hills, and have no blankets, no food. No one knows where they are---perhaps freezing to death. I want to have time to look for my children, and see how many of them I can find;maybe I shall find them among the dead. Hear me, my chiefs; my heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever! ....



Chief Joseph, exhausted and disheartened, surrendered in the Bears Paw Mountains of Montana, forty miles south of Canada ending the Nez Percé war. Thunder Rolling Down the Mountain was born in 1840 in the Wallowa Valley of what is now northeastern Oregon. He took the name of his father, (Old) Chief Joseph or Joseph the Elder. When his father died in 1871, Joseph or Joseph the Younger, was elected his father's successor. He continued his father's efforts to secure the Nez Percé claim to their land while remaining peaceful towards the whites.


October 5, 1880 -
Alonzo T. Cross was issued was issued U.S. Patent No. 232804 for the first ball-point pen, the Stylographic Pen.

Among it's innovations included a screw-plug to prevent users from filling ink into an air tube included in the pen’s housing and used the motion of air bubbles moving from the air tube into the ink chamber to force ink through to the point of the pen.


October 5, 1902 -
Ray Kroc (Michael Keaton) was born on this date.



Mr Kroc invented McDonalds, which caused the collapse of the Soviet Union and made us all fat, allowing us to buy sub prime mortgage properties, which ultimate will bring down the United States as a dominant world power.


October 5, 1930 -
The largest British dirigible, R101 crashed on a hill in Beauvais, France on this date. The ensuing fire killed all 48 of the passengers and crew.



The wreck of the R101 lay where it had fallen until well into 1931, becoming a sightseeing spot for air accident investigators and day trippers who wanted to see the near perfect skeleton of the largest airship in the world.


October 5, 1931 -
Clyde ‘Upside-Down' Pangborn, a daredevil stunt pilot, and Hugh Herndon, Jr., a New York socialite, belly landed Miss Veedol, a Bellanca CH-200 monoplane, in Wenatchee, Wa., to complete the first nonstop flight across the Pacific Ocean from Japan, on this date.



For their accomplishment, Pangborn and Herndon were awarded the the White Medal of Merit of the Imperial Aeronautical Society by Consul General Kensuke Horinouchi of Japan. They also won a $25,000 prize from the Japanese Ashi Shimbun newspaper.


October 5, 1970 -
PBS became a network on this date.



Unlike the model of America's commercial television networks, in which affiliates give up portions of their local advertising airtime in exchange for network programming, PBS member stations pay substantial fees for the shows acquired and distributed by the national organization.


October 5, 1974 -
David Kunst left Waseca, Minnesota on June 20, 1970 and completed the first journey around the world on foot, returning to Waseca, Minnesota, on this date, four years, three months and sixteen days later.



He crossed four continents, walked 14,450 miles and went through 21 pairs of shoes. On October 21, 1972, he and his brother were shot during their portion of the trek through Afghanistan (his brother, John, was unfortunately killed in the incident.) After four months of recuperation, Dave continued on his walk with his other brother Pete.


October 5, 1989 -
Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, the 14th Dalai Lama (Tenzin Gyatso), was named the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for nonviolent efforts to free his homeland from China.

The Committee’s citation read, “The Committee wants to emphasize the fact that the Dalai Lama in his struggle for the liberation of Tibet consistently has opposed the use of violence. He has instead advocated peaceful solutions based upon tolerance and mutual respect in order to preserve the historical and cultural heritage of his people.”

Oh great, I keep blowing my chance of being read in China.


October 5, 2001 –
Barry Bonds hit Home Runs #71 & 72, beating Mark McGuire’s prior record. He went on the hit 73 for the season and is still the current record.



Mr Bonds' (as well as Mr McGuire's) record is tarnished because it is believed that they were on the juice, as opposed to just booze as whore mongerer Babe Ruth was. Aaron Judge, who is not on the juice, hit his 62nd home run on October 4th, cinching the American League’s single-season home run record.



And so it goes