For your amusement and most generous alms.

August 5, 1922 -
The silent-film classic, Blood and Sand, starring Rudolph Valentino and Lila Lee, was released on this date.



The film's editor was Dorothy Arzner, who would later go on to become Hollywood's first female director. Arzner impressed the producers by cannily interspersing stock bull-fighting footage with shots of Rudolph Valentino to make it look like the actor was actually in the ring with real bulls. This was quite a progressive technique in its day.


August 5, 1939 -
The Looney Tunes short, Wise Quacks, directed by Bob Clampett, and starring Porky PigDaffy Duck, was released on this date.



This was the first cartoon to not have WARNER BROS. in a banner. This would continue after Hare-um Scare-um.


August 5 1944 -
The Looney Tunes short, From Hand to Mouse, directed by Chuck Jones, was released on this date.



The unnamed mouse from this cartoon bears a strong physical resemblance to the later redesign of Chuck Jones' mice duo Hubie and Bertie, although both characters would not receive this redesign until Roughly Squeaking two years later.


August 05, 1950-
The Merrie Melodies short, Golden Yeggs, directed by Friz Freleng, and starring Porky Pig and Daffy Duck was released on this date.



This is the first of only two shorts (along with Rocky's next appearance in 1953's Catty Cornered where Rocky is the antagonist to a character other than Bugs Bunny.


August 5, 1953 -
Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr got busy in the surf and someone may have gotten a horse head telegram delivered to their bedroom - From Here to Eternity, also starring Montgomery Cliff, Donna Reed, Frank Sinatra, and Ernest Borgnine, premiered in NYC on this date.



Montgomery Clift, Frank Sinatra and author James Jones were very close during the filming, frequently embarking on monumental drinking binges. Clift coached Sinatra on how to play Maggio during their more sober moments, for which Sinatra was eternally grateful.


August 5, 1955 -
Alfred Hitchcock's surprisingly light comedic touch is on full display in, To Catch A Thief, starring Cary Grant and Grace Kelly, when it opened in NYC on this date.



While working on this film in the French Riviera, Grace Kelly met Prince Rainier of Monaco. It wasn't love at first sight for Kelly, but the prince initiated a long correspondence, which led to their marriage in 1956. Afterward, she became Princess Grace of Monaco, and retired from acting.


August 5, 1960 -
The camp horror classic, The Little Shop of Horrors, directed and produced by Roger Corman, and starring Jonathan Haze, Jackie Joseph, Mel Welles, Dick Miller, and Jack Nicholson, was released on this date.



The film was shot on a budget of $22,500 to $28,000 (nearly $300,000 in 2024), with interiors being shot about two days, utilizing sets that had been left standing from A Bucket of Blood.


August 5, 1966 -
Based of the TV series, Doctor Who, the sequel to the film, Dr. Who and the Daleks, Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D., starring Peter Cushing, Roberta Tovey, Jill Curzon, and Bernard Cribbins, premiered on this date.



The rebel hideout in 2150 is prominently identified as Embankment station on the London Underground's Bakerloo and Northern Lines. There had actually been a station called Embankment once, but it was renamed Charing Cross from 1915; thus Embankment was a suitable name for a fictional station. However, in 1976, 10 years after the movie was released, reality conformed to fiction when the station, now served by the Bakerloo and Northern Lines among others, was given back its original name of Embankment.


August 5, 1966 -
This was a big day in Beatles history:
The Beatles released their Revolver album in UK on this date.



and they also released Yellow Submarine and Eleanor Rigby as a double A single in UK. A lot of kids weekly allowance must have flown out the door on this date.


August 5, 1967 -
Pink Floyd released their debut album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, on which most songs were penned by Syd Barrett, on this date.



Two tracks on the album are credited to the band collectively and one track was written by Roger Waters. The studio album borrows its name from the title of chapter seven of Kenneth Grahame's 1908 novel The Wind in the Willows, which refers to the nature god Pan, who plays his pan pipes at dawn.


August 5, 1976 -
NBC aired a very bizarre TV special celebrating the the 15th anniversary of the Beach Boys, It's OK, directed by Gary Weis and starring the Beach Boys on this date.



The special featured cameos by John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Paul and Linda McCartney and Van Dyke Parks.


August 5, 1978 -
The Rolling Stones had their eighth US No.1 hit with the single Miss You, on this date.



The song was written by Mick Jagger after jamming with keyboardist Billy Preston during rehearsals for forthcoming club dates the Stones were playing.


August 5, 1998 -
The American spin-off of the British series Whose Line Is It Anyway?, hosted by Drew Carey and starring Ryan Stiles, Colin Mochrie, and Wayne Brady, premiered on ABC-TV, on this date.



The Whose line crew was such a well-oiled machine that they could shoot 9 to 12 episodes on a single weekend. Shooting a whole season took only three or four weekends every year. The cast revealed it was one of the reasons they were so great together and had great relationships with each other, because they didn't have to spend that much time together.


Another episode of ACME's Little Known Animal Facts


Today in History:
August 5, 1861 -
Folks, please note: The US government established the first income tax on US citizens on this date (Abraham Lincoln was president at the time.) The Revenue Act of 1862 established a tax of 3 percent on incomes of more than $800 Dollars.



The tax, which was used for financial aid during the Civil War, was rescinded in 1872.


August 5, 1884 –
The cornerstone for the Statue of Liberty was laid on Bedloe's Island in New York Harbor on this date.

Children and horses were kept indoors on that day for fear of offending their delicate nature.


August 5, 1914 -
The first electric traffic signal, based on a design by James Hoge, was installed on this date.

The system of red and green lights, indicating stop and go, was installed in Cleveland, Ohio, on the corner of East 105th Street and Euclid Avenue. Lost in the miasma of time is the name of the person that first ran the red light.


August 5, 1924 –
The comic strip, Little Orphan Annie by Harold Gray, debuted the Chicago Tribune on this date.

Apparently there is no deep, dark meaning behind the fact that Annie has no pupils; that was just the style of the artist. All of the characters in the Little Orphan Annie comic strip had no pupils; it wasn't just Annie. Even her dog Sandy had no pupils.

Now you know.


August 5, 1926 -
Harry Houdini stayed in a coffin, submerged in the swimming pool of New York's Hotel Shelton for one hour and a half, on this date.

Note: He currently has exceeded his own record substantially.


On August 4, 1955, Carmen Miranda suffered a heart attack during a segment of the live TV show The Jimmy Durante Show, although she did not realize it. After completing a dance number, she fell to her knees, and Durante instinctively told the band to "stop da music!".



He helped Miranda up to her feet as she laughed "I'm all out of breath!". "Dat's OK, honey, I'll take yer lines", Durante replied. Miranda laughed again and quickly pulled herself together, finishing the show. At the end of the broadcast, she smiled and waved, then exited the stage. She died later that night, on August 5, 1955, after suffering a second heart attack at her home in Beverly Hills.



As with all great performers - the show had to go on.


August 5, 1957 –
American Bandstand, a local Philadelphia show dedicated to the teenage "baby-boomers" by playing the songs and showing popular dances of the time, hosted by Dick Clark, debuted nationally on the ABC television network on this date.



Please be careful, Zombie Mr. Clark still roams the nation in search of brains to feast upon.

August 5, 1962 -
64 years ago today, a very unhappy Marilyn Monroe (Norma J. Mortenson) died of natural causes, aggravated by sleeping pills, in her Brentwood home.



Unless she was murdered.


August 5, 1981 -
As dementia continued to take its karma toll, President Ronald Reagan began firing 11,359 air-traffic controllers striking in violation of his order for them to return to work on this date.



The executive action, regarded as extreme by many, significantly slows air travel for months.


Feel free to sing Happy Birthday, unencumbered by the whole copyright issue thing, to the Curiosity Rover parked on Mars, at the moment.



NASA has programmed the Curiosity Rover to sing itself Happy Birthday every year, on the anniversary of it’s landing date on Mars at 10:32 p.m. PDT on August 5, 2012.



And so it goes.

Never trust your dog to guard your sandwich

It's St. Sithney Day. He is the patron saint of mad dogs.

Make of this what you wish:



A Breton folk story, states that God asked Sithney to be the patron saint of girls seeking husbands, but Sithney said he would rather be the patron saint of mad dogs and get some rest.

(And you thought there were no Jewish comedians as saints.)


Barack Obama is 65 years old today and still happily retired and married.



I'm hoping the former president is enjoying his summer. (His play list came out last week.)


August 4, 1942 –
The Paramount Picture film, Holiday Inn, directed by Mark Sandrich and starring Fred Astaire and Bing Crosby was released in theaters on this date. Kemmons Wilson, who founded the Holiday Inn motel chain in 1952, named it after this movie.



Strangely enough, White Christmas was not expected to be a hit song. During filming, it was thought that Bing Crosby's song, Be Careful, It's My Heart, would be the movie's big hit. When Crosby first heard the song, he was not impressed by it. After Irving Berlin played the song on the piano during rehearsals, Crosby said in a bland voice, "I don't think we'll have any problem with that one, Irv."


August 4, 1954 -
Douglas Sirk's first Technicolor gift for film goers, Magnificent Obsession, was released on this date.



Rock Hudson never knew that Jane Wyman had served as an FBI informer under the code name T-10, providing the names of actors within the motion picture industry whom they believed to be communist sympathizers.


August 04, 1956-
The Merrie Melodies short, Rocket-bye Baby, directed by Chuck Jones, was released on this date.



One of the few Looney Tunes where Mel Blanc doesn't do any voices. Instead, Daws Butler, famous for the voices of Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound and other characters in the Hanna-Barbera library, and June Foray, most famous as the voice of Rocky the Flying Squirrel, provided the vocal content of the film. No recurring characters were used. As Blanc's contract stated that he receive sole credit for voice work, no actors are credited.


August 4, 1957 -
The Everly Brothers appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show for the second time, (Dan Dailey was subbing for Ed Sullivan, at the time - no word on whether or not Ed was nursing a severe hangover at the time,) on this date.



They performed the same song they played from their June 30th appearance, Bye, Bye Love and then sang Doll Baby.


August 4, 1958 –
The Billboard Hot 100 was published for the first time on this date. The first number-one song of the Hot 100 was Poor Little Fool by Ricky Nelson.



The song was written by 17-year-old Sharon Sheeley when she was still attending high school in Newport Beach, California. Female songwriters were rare at the time, and when the song climbed to #1 in the US, she became the first woman to compose an American chart-topper on her own.


August 4, 1972 -
The blaxploitation classic Super Fly, directed by Gordon Parks Jr. and starring Ron O'Neal, premiered in the US on this date. The soundtrack by Curtis Mayfield became a soul music landmark.



All the music in the movie was done by Curtis Mayfield. This film is one of only a few films where the soundtrack grossed more than the film itself.


Today's moment of Zen


Today in History:
August 4, 1693 -
Oh, great day in the morning (this day should be a great religious and national holiday),



Blind Benedictine Dom Perignon invents champagne on this date.



He has been quoted as saying, "Come quickly, brothers, I'm drinking stars!" upon tasting his accidental brew.


August 4, 1790 -
US Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton urged the Congress that ten boats for the collection of revenue needed to be built. This was to stop smuggling, especially of coffee, which was hampering trade. Congress passed the Tariff Act on this date.



The Coast Guard was born as the Revenue Cutter Service. The Coast Guard was empowered to board and inspect any vessel in US waters and any US boat anywhere in the world.


August 4, 1792 -



Percy Bysshe Shelley, one of England's greatest Romantic poets was born on this date. He died in a tragic boating accident (along with two others) before the age of 30, but he gave us many masterpieces, including Ozymandias, Music, When Soft Voices Die and Ode To The West Wind.

The fish eaten bodies were washed ashore at Viareggio, where, in the presence of his friend Lord Byron, he was burned on the beach - his heart was given to his wife, Mary Shelley, who carried it with her in a silken shroud everywhere she went for the rest of her life.



All I can say is that I'm glad it was just his heart.


August 4, 1884 -
Thomas Stevens wearily arrived in Boston on this date, 104 days after leaving San Francisco (April 22, 1884,) completing the first bicycle trip (on a penny-farthing) to cross the US.



He later continued around world (two years, nine months) on a trip financed with articles for Outing and the Wheelman magazines. The bicycle part of his journey around the world ended on December 17, 1886, when he reached Yokohama, Japan. Stevens returned by steamer to San Francisco, on January 3, 1887.

It’s important to note that some areas were inaccessible to Stevens during his journey so he had to get around them via boat or train, but he did bike through everything he could.


August 4, 1892 -
Someone took an axe and killed Lizzie Borden's millionaire parents: Andrew receives 10 whacks and Abby 14. Based on strong circumstantial evidence, Sunday school teacher Lizzie was later tried for the murders.



She was acquitted of the murders by an all-male jury.


August 4, 1901 -
Louis Armstrong (medicinal marijuana and laxative enthusiast) always stated that his birthday was on the Fourth of July, a date that has been noted in many biographies.







During the 1980's, Louis Armstrong's baptismal certificate was discovered in the Sacred Heart of Jesus Church in New Orleans, showing his actual birth date was August 4th, 1901.


August 4, 1914 -
The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime - British foreign secretary, Sir Edward Grey



Britain and Belgium declared war after German troops entered Belgium. The United States proclaimed its neutrality (more on all of this later.)


August 4, 1922 -
All 13 million telephones in North America went silent for one minute at sunset during the funeral services of Alexander Graham Bell on this date. Bell was buried in a coffin built by his lab staff in a tomb carved into the solid rock of Beinn Bhreagh Mountain on his estate in Nova Scotia, Canada.



To commemorate his pioneering contributions to telecommunications technology, AT&T and the Bell System suspends service at their switchboards and switching stations across Canada and the United States.


August 4, 1930 -
Michael Cullen was a grocer's grocer. He started working for The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company (A & P) at 18 and worked there for 17 years. He then went to work for Kroger Stores for 11 years but he had a dream.

Cullen leased a vacant garage at the corner of 171st Street and Jamaica Avenue in Queens, just a few blocks from a busy shopping district. On August 4, 1930, King Kullen Grocery Company opened the doors to the world's first supermarket.



We will be going to a King Kullen this weekend, so I can check out how they are celebrating the holiday.


August 4, 1964 -
Vietcong torpedo boats launched an unprovoked attack against the U.S.S. Maddox, while the destroyer was patrolling the Gulf of Tonkin. The only problem was - it may all have been a hoax.



Regardless, the Congress responded by passing the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorizing President Johnson "to take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States and to prevent further aggression."



And so it goes.

Watch what you do

Today is National Grab Some Nuts Day
.

I don't believe this can legally be celebrated in all 50 states, (especially Florida and Texas.)

How you celebrate is between you and your god.


August 3, 1929 -
Four famous vaudevillian performers took a chance on the new medium of 'talking pictures' with the general release of the film, The Cocoanuts, starring the Four Marx Brothers --

Chico, Groucho, Harpo and Zeppo, on this date,.



When The Marx Brothers were shown the final cut of the film, they were so horrified they tried to buy the negative back and prevent its release. Paramount wisely resisted - the movie turned out to be a big box office hit, with a $1,800,000 gross making it one of the most successful early talking films.


July 30, 1946 -
The Merrie Melodies short, Bacall to Arms, directed by Bob Clampett, was released on this date.



Originally, the audio track for the To Have and Have Not parody featured the actual audio of Bogart and Bacall from the film. However, the Warner Bros. legal department informed the producers that they could actually not re-use the film's audio track, so it had to be re-recorded with impersonators.


August 03, 1947-
The Merrie Melodies short, A Pest in the House, directed by Chuck Jones, and starring Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd, was released on this date.



The film is notable for featuring a sort of "in-between" interpretation of Daffy Duck. He is not necessarily the zany, impish interpretation used famously by Tex Avery and Bob Clampett, nor is he the greedy, self-preservationist version that Chuck Jones later popularized in the 1950s.


August 3, 1963 -
Allan Sherman released Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah (A Letter from Camp), in the US on this date.



Sherman was a writer on The Steve Allen Show and created the game show I've Got a Secret. He went on to record comedy albums. The song won a 1964 Grammy Award for comedy.

And somehow in the same universe, The Beach Boys’ Surfer Girl was released on this date as well. (This is the first song Brian Wilson ever wrote and the first one he produced.)



Ah, sweet mysteries of life. (The B-side of the single was Little Deuce Coupe.)


August 3, 1966 -
Following the end of the series, Columbia Pictures released the animated film, The Man Called Flintstone, directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera and featuring the voice work of Alan Reed, Mel Blanc, Jean Vander Pyl, and Gerry Johnson, on this date.



This was the last Hanna-Barbera theatrical cartoon for Columbia Pictures, as well as the last after Hanna-Barbera productions stopped making theatrical cartoons while focusing on animated TV projects. In 1966, Hanna-Barbera was later acquired by Great American Broadcasting when the animation studio began producing their Saturday Morning cartoons.


August 3, 1968 -
The revisionist Western film, Hang 'Em High, directed by Ted Post and starring Clint Eastwood, Inger Stevens, Ed Begley, and Pat Hingle, was released on this date.



Clint Eastwood's first leading role in a Hollywood film. He was already 38 years old. Hang 'Em High is also notable for being Eastwood's first assignment as a producer.


August 3, 1970 -
Shelved for two years after a disastrous test screening at which audiences yelled at the screen and walked out of the theater, Warner Brothers finally released Performance, directed by Donald Cammell, and Nicolas Roeg, and starring James Fox, Mick Jagger, Anita Pallenberg, and Michèle Breton, on this date in New York City.



Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg (mainly responsible for the 'look' of the film) also benefited from a lack of interference from Warner Bros. studio executives, who believed they were getting a Rolling Stones equivalent of A Hard Day's Night, Instead, they delivered a dark, experimental film which included graphic depictions of violence, sex and drug use.


August 3, 1973 -
Stevie Wonder released his 16th studio album Innervisions, on this date. Wonder played nearly all instruments on six of the album's nine tracks.



Three days after the album's release, Wonder was in a terrible car accident and lay in a coma for four days before his friend and tour director Ira Tucker was able to get a response from him: "I got right down in his ear and sang 'Higher Ground'. His hand was resting on my arm and after a while his fingers started going in time with the song. I said yeah, yeah!! This dude is going to make it!"


August 3, 1979 -
A sequel to the George Lucas film American Graffiti, More American Graffiti, directed by Bill L. Norton and starring, Candy Clark, Ron Howard, Paul Le Mat, Cindy Williams, Mackenzie Phillips, Charles Martin Smith, Bo Hopkins, and Harrison Ford, opened in the US on this date. George Lucas was the executive producer of the film.



George Lucas came up with the idea of shooting each of the four storylines in a different aspect ratio. Milner's Drag racing was in the 1950's exploitation style using a wide angle, stationary camera. The Vietnam sequences were shot on 16-milimeter film, like the television reports of the time. Laurie and Steve's campus riot resembled a Hollywood version of student rebellions like The Strawberry Statement or Getting Straight. Debbie's trip were in multiple-image split-screen, inspired by Woodstock.


August 3, 1979 -
The Talking Heads release their third album, Fear of Music, on this date.



The album, produced by Brian Eno, was recorded in Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth's New York City loft where the band often rehearsed. They parked a mobile recording unit outside to record the tracks as they played from the loft.


August 3, 1985 -
Tears For Fears found themselves again on the Billboard charts when Shout hit No.1 on this date, (Everybody Wants To Rule The World was their first hit.)



This was written by Tears For Fears frontman Roland Orzabal and keyboard player Ian Stanley. In the liner notes to the single, Orzabal explained: "The song was written in my front room on just a small synthesizer and a drum machine. Initially I only had the chorus, which was very repetitive, like a mantra. I played it to Ian Stanley, our keyboardist, and Chris Hughes, the producer. I saw it as a good album track, but they were convinced it would be a hit around the world."


August 3, 1991 –
Pearl Jam plays the club RKCNDY in Seattle on this date. The show is filmed and used to create their first video for the song Alive. The audio from the show was used in the video, as the band hated the idea of lip-synching.



The instrumental demo of this song was titled Dollar Short. Eddie Vedder's lyrics went in a direction the band didn't expect, but they loved what they heard and quickly agreed that he should be their lead singer - only one other guy had been auditioned. Reflecting on how everything came together so quickly, the band credited timing and fate for Vedder's arrival. Eddie said that it took him 12 hours to write and record the songs for the demo, and he could have easily blown it off.


August 3, 1996 -
The Macarena by Los Del Rio appeared at #1 on the pop charts on this date. (For God sake, please don't listen. Save yourself from the ensuing madness.)



This was originally released on a local label in Spain in 1993, where it did fairly well. The next year, the American label BMG bought the Spanish label and set out to make Macarena a hit in America. They marketed an English language version to dance clubs and cruise ships, then released it as a single in 1995. It was a minor hit until the summer of 1996, when the Macarena dance craze hit America.


August 3, 2001 -
Disney's surprise comedy hit, The Princess Diaries, directed by Gary Marshall and starring Julie Andrews, Héctor Elizondo, and introducing Anne Hathaway, went into general release in the US on this date.



One of the waiters in the dinner scene when Mia breaks the water glass says, "It happens all the time." The same actor played a waiter in Pretty Woman, and said the same line when Vivian Ward (Julia Roberts) flings the snail and the waiter catches it. Both movies were directed by Garry Marshall, as well as featured Hector Elizondo and Larry Miller.


Word of the Day.


Today in History:
August 3, 1492 -
File this under: more lies my teacher told me.



Christopher Columbus famously sailed from the port of Palos de la Frontera, in southern Spain across the ocean blue in a fleet of three ships: the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria de Nuestra Senora la Reina de Los Angeles de Porciuncula. (Every thing else you think you know about Columbus is a lie.)


August 3, 1921 –
Under the direction of the Ohio Department of Agriculture, Lt. John A. Macready, a U.S. Army pilot, made the first application of 175 pounds of lead arsenate pesticide with a modified Curtiss JN-6 "Super Jenny.", thus creating crop dusting.

Lt. Macready flight over a six acre Catalpa tree grove near Troy, Ohio, killed almost 99% of the Sphinx Moth caterpillars, saving 5,000 trees. The government then utilized aerial application in the Southern states.


August 3, 1926 -
I have a simple life. I mean, you just give me a drum roll, they announce my name, and I come out and sing. In my job I have a contract that says I'm a singer. So I sing.

Anthony Dominick Benedetto, last of the great saloon singers was born on this date.







The world is obviously a little less bright now that we've lost Tony


August 3, 1941 -
Martha Kostyra, business magnate, television host, author, magazine publisher and ex-con was born on this date.



Remember folks, please don't piss off Martha - she's a woman of a certain age, who raises her own poultry, hold her hard liquor, hangs out with rappers, and has her own line of CBD products.


August 3, 1943 (I have seen this event posted as happening on August 30th)-
Gen George Patton bitch slapped shell-shocked private Charles Kuhl, in the hospital accusing him of cowardice, on this date.



The incident nearly ended Patton's career; he was ordered by Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower to apologize for this and a second, similar episode. It seemed to help Francis Ford Coppola's career though.


August 3, 1946 -
Santa Claus Land, the world's first themed amusement park, opened in Santa Claus, Indiana, on this date.



The park offered a Santa, a toy shop, toy displays, a restaurant, and themed children's rides, one of which was The Freedom Train. Santa Claus Land didn't charge admission until 1955 and changed its name to Holiday World & Splashin' Safari in 1984.


On August 3, 1958, the U.S. nuclear submarine Nautilus accomplished the first undersea voyage to the geographic North Pole.



The world's first nuclear submarine, the Nautilus dove at Point Barrow, Alaska, and traveled nearly 1,000 miles under the Arctic ice cap to reach the top of the world.


August 3, 1966 -
Comedian and social critic Lenny Bruce died of a morphine overdose in his Hollywood Hills home on this date, two years after his original obituary was published in The Realist.



At the time of his death, Bruce was being maliciously harassed by police and districts attorney in various states for his groundbreaking standup performances, causing great difficulty in finding venues at which to perform. After his death, he became a cult hero, many other comics, like George Carlin and Richard Pryor, considering him a martyr to the cause of free speech.


August 3, 1977 –
Tandy Corporation announced the TRS-80, one of the world’s first mass-produced personal computers.



The basic model originally shipped with 4 KB of RAM.



And so it goes.