Watching a sunset is to connect with the Divine

Hope you got to see Manhattanhenge last night,

If you missed it, fear not, you have reason enough to live - it comes around again next yearin late May.


July 13, 1935 -
The Merrie Melodies short, Country Mouse, directed by Friz Freleng, was released on this date.



In the opening, while Country Mouse is working the punching bag, a poster behind him advertises Battling Freleng. Freleng was the director of this cartoon.


July 13, 1939 —
When Frank Sinatra was just starting out as a singer, he carried his own P.A. system to the dives in which he typically performed. He got his big break when bandleader Harry James' wife heard him sing as a waiter and recommended him to her husband.





Sinatra made his first commercial recording on this date — Melancholy Mood and From The Bottom Of My Heart with Harry James and his Orchestra for the Brunswick label. No more than 8,000 copies of the record were sold.


July 13, 1946 -
The Merrie Melodies short, The Eager Beaver, directed by Chuck Jones, was released on this date.



Lots of early versions of other castmate characterizations. Henry Hawk, Pepe le Pew, Bugs Bunny and Porky Pig can all be glimpsed or heard here.


July 13, 1949 -
Paramount Picture's releases second film adaptation of the F. Scott Fitzgerald classic, The Great Gatsby, starring Alan Ladd, Betty Field, Macdonald Carey, Ruth Hussey, Barry Sullivan, Shelley Winters, and Howard Da Silva, premiered in the US on this date.



The original director was John Farrow. However, he was replaced with Elliott Nugent as he and the producer Richard Maibaum could not agree on the casting of Daisy Buchanan: Farrow wanted to cast Gene Tierney whereas Maibaum's choice for the role was Betty Field. Farrow's daughter Mia Farrow played Daisy in The Great Gatsby 25 years later.


July 13, 1953 -
The drama, Titanic, directed by Jean Negulesco and starring Clifton Webb, Barbara Stanwyck, Robert Wagner, Audrey Dalton, Harper Carter, Thelma Ritter, Brian Aherne, and Richard Basehart, set sail on this date.



The filming of the disaster had a powerful effect on Barbara Stanwyck, who recalled: "The night we were making the scene of the dying ship in the outdoor tank at Twentieth, it was bitter cold. I was 47 feet up in the air in a lifeboat swinging on the davits. The water below was agitated into a heavy rolling mass and it was thick with other lifeboats full of women and children. I looked down and thought: If one of these ropes snaps now, it's goodbye for you. Then I looked up at the faces lined along the rail - those left behind to die with the ship. I thought of the men and women who had been through this thing in our time. We were re-creating an actual tragedy and I burst into tears. I shook with great racking sobs and couldn't stop."


July 13, 1955 -
The Looney Tunes short, Double or Mutton, directed by Chuck Jones, and starring Ralph Wolf and Sam Sheepdog, was released on this date.



Ralph Wolf resembles his cast mate cousin Wile E. Coyote, except for his bright red nose and the fact he speaks regularly. Wile rarely, if ever, spoke in his feature shorts.


July 13, 1959 -
Dedicated to the One I Love, by The Shirelles, was released on this date.



This was originally recorded by The 5 Royales in 1958. The Shirelles' version first peaked at #83 in 1959, but when it was re-released in 1961 it went to #3.  Normally, Shirley Owens Alston was the Shirelles' lead singer. However, on this song, Doris Coley Kenner sang lead.


July 13, 1960 -
20th Century Fox released the sci-fi adventure film The Lost World (based on the novel by Arthur Conan Doyle), directed by Irwin Allen and starring Michael Rennie, Jill St. John, Claude Rains and Fernando Lamas (who looked marvelous), to U.S. theaters on this date.



Director Irwin Allen wanted to use stop-motion dinosaurs for this film, but due to budget reasons he had to use lizards - mainly monitor lizards - as dinosaurs. Plastic horns and spikes were attached to them to make them look more like dinosaurs.  The technique will later be dubbed Slurpasaur by fans.


July 13, 1967 –
Pink Floyd made their second appearance on BBC Top Of The Pops to promote their new single See Emily Play which was hosted by Pete Murray (The BBC initially aired the broadcast on July 6th. The 13th was a rebroadcast.)



David Gilmour was asked by the members of Pink Floyd to join the band to supplement the guitar work of the increasingly erratic Syd Barrett. For a brief time, Syd and David were both members of Pink Floyd at the same time. When Barrett's mental breakdown made it impossible for him to continue with the group, Gilmour became a permanent, contributing member in time for their second album, 1968's A Saucerful of Secrets. Syd Barrett contributed one track to that album, his last with Pink Floyd. Syd departed the band soon after that.


July 13, 1974 –
Elton John's eighth studio Caribou went to No.1 on the Billboard Album Chart on this date, It became his third No.1 album.



Elton and his band toured the last five months of 1973 before heading into Caribou Ranch studios in Colorado in January 1974 to record their next album in a window of just 10 days. They had to cut some corners (fewer takes, less refinement), but still made a very impressive album, a testament to the creative energy of those involved (including Bernie Taupin, who had to write a lot of lyrics very quickly).


July 13, 1974 -
George McRae's single Rock Your Baby became the first disco song to hit #1 on this date.



The song was written by Harry Wayne Casey and Richard Finch of KC & The Sunshine Band, and it formed the basis for their wildly successful writing and performing partnership which yielded five more US #1 hits and pioneered the disco sound.


July 13, 1985 -
41 years ago, I had only recently patented the long birthday weekend....



(We weren't cool enough to get MTV in The Bronx at the time, so we had to settle for the local TV broadcast of Live Aid.)



(Find time to watch this short segment of a documentary about behind the scenes events of the Live Aid production.)



(still the greatest televised rock and roll performance of all time.)



We brought the 'big TV' out into my father-in-law's backyard and joined the other nearly 2 billion people who tuned into Live Aid on this date.


July 13, 1990 -
Jerry Zucker's romantic thriller Ghost, starring Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore, Whoopi Goldberg, and Tony Goldwyn, premiered in the US on this date.



The role of Oda Mae Brown was not written with Whoopi Goldberg in mind, but Patrick Swayze, an admirer of hers, convinced the producers that she would be right for the part.


Word of the Day.


Today in History
July 13, 1793 (Décade III, Quintidi de Messidor de l'Année 213 de la Révolution) -



French revolutionary writer Jean Paul Marat was stabbed to death in his bathtub by Charlotte Corday, on this date, as she gives him a list of names to be guillotined. The assassination inspired the famous painting by Jacques Louis David; Corday was executed four days after slaying Marat.



After the heavy blade fell, an executioner's assistant named Francois le Gros (Fat Frank) picked up the severed head by the hair and brimming with Revolutionary fervor slapped Corday's cheek. Several eyewitnesses saw her face flush red with anger, not just one cheek but both cheeks. Some though they perceived disgust curl her lips.


July 13, 1846 -
Horace Greeley advises his readers to 'Go west young man'  on this date.

Cynics note that he owns stock in a company that manufactures compasses.



I'm not sure but I don't think this is what Mr. Greeley had in mind.


July 13, 1923 -
The Hollywood Sign was officially dedicated in the hills above Hollywood, Los Angeles on this date. It originally reads "Hollywoodland" but the four last letters are dropped after renovation in 1949. Unfortunately it became a perennial favorite suicide location.



Over the years, the sign had fallen into disrepair. A public campaign to restore the landmark Hollywood Sign was spearheaded in 1978, in a large part by pornographer Hugh Hefner and shock rocker Alice Cooper.


July 13, 1946 -
Smoke 'em if you got 'em.



It's Richard Anthony Marin's birthday today.


July 13, 1955 -
Ruth Ellis was last English woman executed by hanging on this date.



Ten days before she had shot her lover, race car driver David Blakely, Ellis suffered a miscarriage after Blakely, the baby's father, punched her in the stomach. She was having a bad day.


July 13, 1977 -
Starting at about 9 PM on this date, four lightning struck high-voltage transmission lines within the course of about half-an-hour, knocking out electricity and plunging millions of residents of New York City into a 25 hour black-out .



The 1977 blackout, unlike the 1965 and 2003 blackouts, resulted in city-wide looting and other disorder, including arson. About 4,500 people were arrested during the riots, which resulted in damage estimated at $61 million.


July 13, 1985 -
President Ronald Reagan has a polyp removed from his colon on this date.

The polyp, named Larry, lived comfortable at the Reagan ranch, keeping Nancy company until the end. Recent declassified notes reveal that 'Larry' had actually been running the country during Reagan early undisclosed onset of Alzheimer's. George H.W. Bush got his first taste of the Presidency for a day and got hooked.


July 13, 1994 -
Jeff Gillooly (and his fabulous 70s porn 'stache,) Tonya Harding's ex-husband, was sentenced to two years in prison for his role in the attack on Nancy Kerrigan.

He served six months.


On July 13, 1994, Germany's Constitutional Court ended the ban on German troops fighting outside the country.

(On July 14, 1994, France's Constitutional Court ruled all of France needs to sleep with one eye open, turned towards the German border.)



And so it goes.


Happy Birthday Debbie Finn, where ever you are

Every day can end beautifully

If you missed seeing Manhattanhenge last night, (as unfortunately I did - I was celebrating with the Caligaris in an undisclosed location.)

you could try again tonight at 8:21 pm ET (enjoy it for me.).



Those Illuminati are generous, aren't they?

(And hey, pay attention to the traffic lights. Don't ruin my birthday by getting run over by a car!)


July 12, 1912 -
The first foreign-made film to premiere in America, Queen Elizabeth (Les Amours de la Reine Élisabeth), starring Sarah Bernhardt premiered on this date in NYC.



Rumors that Bernhardt performed in the film uniped are untrue. Bernhardt did lose her leg to gangrene in 1915.


July 12, 1947 -
The Merrie Melodies short, Crowing Pains, directed by Bob McKimson, and starring Sylvester, Foghorn Leghorn, Henery Hawk, and the Barnyard Dawg, was released on this date.



Sylvester, Dawg, and Foghorn Leghorn were shown here early in their screen careers. Their appearances and voice characteristics, as well as their sparring partners, would continue to evolve over the decades.


July 12, 1962 -
The Rolling Stones, (or more precisely, the group that they became) gave their first concert on this date. The concert was held in London at the Marquee Club.

At the time, the band was called The Rollin' Stones - they got their current name in 1963. One of the most successful groups in history, the band has sold more than 200 million albums and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989.


July 12, 1976 –
Family Feud, hosted by Richard Dawson, debuted on ABC on this date. It later aired on CBS and then in syndication.



There were some objections to Richard kissing strange women on national television. ABC tried to influence the kissing to stop, but Dawson rebelled and said he was going to do it. Mark Goodson asked people to write in and say in favor of kissing or not, the responses were overwhelmingly in favor of keeping the kissing on.


July 12, 1984 -
Madonna's Like a Virgin video premiered on MTV on this date and became an instant hit.



The songwriting team of Tom Kelly and Billy Steinberg wrote Like A Virgin. Other songs they have written include Eternal Flame by the Bangles, So Emotional by Whitney Houston, True Colors by Cyndi Lauper, and Alone by Heart. All were #1 hits in the US featuring female vocalists. Steinberg considers "Virgin" their most famous song.


July 12, 1986 -
The band, Simply Red's hit Holding Back the Years topped the charts on this date.



Simply Red is singer Mick Hucknall ("Red" was his nickname because of his red hair). He originally recorded this in 1979 with his band The Frantic Elevators.


July 12, 1990 -
Viewers first met Dr. Joel Fleischman and the folks in Cicely, Alaska when Northern Exposure premiered on CBS TV on this date.



The mural for Roslyn's Café in the opening credits is an actual café. The apostrophe and an S was added in since the show is supposed to take place in Cicely, Alaska. After the show was completed, the apostrophe and the S was removed from the mural.


July 12, 1991 -
John Singleton directorial debut, Boyz N the Hood, starring Ice Cube, Cuba Gooding Jr., Morris Chestnut, Larry Fishburne, Nia Long, Regina King, and Angela Bassett, went into general release on this date. (John Singleton's Oscar nomination for Best Director at the age of 24 made him the youngest director to ever receive such an accolade, beating Orson Welles by a good two years.)



Writer and director John Singleton based Tre Styles' (Cuba Gooding Jr.) childhood on his own. Singleton's father was a mortgage broker like Furious Styles (Laurence Fishburne). When he was twelve, Singleton moved in with his father in South Los Angeles, California. Like Trey, Singleton stayed out of trouble with his father's guidance and went to college.


July 12, 1997 –
The joys of angry prison sex were explored far more than you wanted them to be when Oz, starring Ernie Hudson, Terry Kinney, J. K. Simmons, and B.D. Wong premiered on HBO, on this date



Some cast members that played prisoners have noted that, throughout the series, if you showed up late to the set, your punishment would be that your character would either die or be raped the next week.


July 12, 2002 –
Most of main stream America becam aware of OCD syndrome when Monk, starring Tony Shalhoub, premiered on the USA Network, on this date.



Syndicated and streaming prints of the episode use the Randy Newman It's a Jungle Out There theme song in place of the original pilot/season one theme set to a montage of scenes from Mr. Monk and the Candidate and the original season one theme. The footage in which the original theme song played (showing Monk cleaning his apartment and preparing his talk with Dr. Kroger) is shown without the Jeff Beal theme.


Another album from the discount bin at The ACME Record Shoppe


Today in History:
July 12, 100 BCE -
Julius Caesar was born on this date. He is famous for fighting the Garlic Wars and dying of the unkindest cut. His death so shocked the people of Rome that they buried him instead of praising him, although this may have been because he was a Proud Man.



Interesting to note that in between, fighting across most of Europe, Caesar was quoted as saying, It is easier to find men who will volunteer to die, than to find those who are willing to endure pain with patience.


July 12, 1807 (there is some confusion about the exact date, but since it's my birthday, I get to choose.) -
The famous world conqueror Napoleon Bonaparte was attacked and defeated by … bunnies. The emperor had requested that a rabbit hunt be arranged for himself and his men. His chief of staff Alexandre Berthier set it up and had men round up reportedly 3,000 rabbits for the occasion.



When the rabbits were released from their cages, the hunt was ready to go. At least that was the plan! But the bunnies charged toward Bonaparte and his men in a vicious and unstoppable onslaught. The man who was dominating Europe was no match for a battle with bunnies. If only he had The Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch!


July 12, 1908 -
Milton Berle was an Emmy-winning American comedian who was born Milton Berlinger, on this date. As the manic host of NBC's Texaco Star Theater (1948-1955), he was the first major star of television. He became known as Uncle Miltie to millions during TV's Golden Age.



That's all well and good but the real thing you want to know about Uncle Miltie is his prodigious member.



now try getting that out of your mind's eye.


Other notable July 12 birthdays include:
The question is not what you look at, but what you see.



Henry David Thoreau (1817)


Learn to do common things uncommonly well



George Washington Carver (1861 - there is no actual documentation on his exact birth date)

(God bless you Dr. Carver, for your work on alcohol.)


All the sounds of the earth are like music.



Oscar Hammerstein II (1895)


We are called to be architects of the future, not its victims.



R. Buckminster Fuller (1895)


Moe and Larry were the best. We worked well together and enjoyed every moment of it.



"Curly" Joe DeRita (1909)


The rock n' roll lifestyle did have its perks, but it wasn't all limos and parties in the early days.



Christine McVie (1943)


Number one, like yourself. Number two, you have to eat healthy. And number three, you've got to squeeze your buns. That's my formula.

Richard Simmons (1948)


I don't actually live in America; we live on a small island off the coast

Me (1960)

(make sure you check out this year's Godzilla's Atoll LPs)


Figure skaters have awful perceptions of hockey players.



Kristi Yamaguchi (1971)


Let us pick up our books and our pens. They are our most powerful weapons.



Nobel Peace laureate Malala Yousafzai (1997)


July 12, 1843 -
Mormon numero uno Joseph Smith discloses a divine revelation instructing his followers to take multiple wives, in what the LDS Church calls "plural marriage" but everyone else calls polygamy.



The Mormons are ultimately forced to disclaim the practice in September 1890.


On July 12, 1957, Dwight D. Eisenhower became the first president to employ a helicopter while in office. The first helicopter put into presidential service was the HMX-1 "Nighthawks."

Though helicopters had been in operational use by the American military since 1944, concerns over their safety caused the Secret Service to bar their use for the nation’s chief executive except in case of emergency.


July 12, 1960 -
In 1955, a French electrician named André Cassagnes got an idea for a new toy after seeing how an electrostatic charge could hold aluminum powder to glass. He worked up a prototype for the toy—based on the design of a television screen—in his basement workshop and called it L’Ecran Magique, or the Magic Screen.



The first Etch-A-Sketch went on sale on this date.


July 12, 1979 -
Bonanno crime boss Carmine Galante, the "cigar problem", was whacked at Joe and Mary's Restaurant in Brooklyn on this date. Galante died with a cigar still in his mouth.



Almost everyone in the New York mob feared the ruthless crime boss, so the killing was sanctioned by the consensus of Paul Castellano, Joe Bonanno and Santo Trafficante.


July 12, 1979 -
Bill Veeck, owner of the White Sox, decided to have "Disco Demolition Night" at Chicago's Comiskey Park, where baseball tickets cost only $.98 if the purchaser brought along a disco record for the bonfire on this date.



During the second game of the doubleheader, thousands of vinyl LPs flew onto the field, generating enough chaos that the White Sox are forced to forfeit. (One of our bunkies shared with us that Mike Veeck, Bob Veeck's son, along with Bill Murray, owns a string of independent baseball teams. Their motto: "Fun is Good."



And so it goes.

If you're stuck for a gift suggestion

Just giving you a brief heads up - if in doubt, I'll happily accept gold ingots

Hey, if Senator Bob Menendezcan accept them, who I'm I to turn them down.

This one, not so much, thank you.


It was great foresight on the part of our beloved city forefathers to lay out the city in such a way that this happens every year just around my birthday.

Once again, the sun will be perfectly lined up with the east-west streets of New York.



So get outside to catch the 'Full Sun on the Grid' at 8:20 pm ET and enjoy it. (You can see it one more time tomorrow night but it might be cloudy. )


ACME would like to issue this public service announcement concerning Brain Freeze (also known as sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia)  -

Now to the point at hand -



Why bring this up? The date today is 7/11 (at least in this country. Foreigners and other degenerates refer to the day as 11/7 but that's another story...)

The convenience store 7-Eleven celebrates their name day, so to speak (and their 99th birthday,) by giving away Slurpees to the "brain freeze" fearless public, but you do need to have a 7Rewards loyalty membership card. That doesn't mean you can't make a frozen concoction and home and toast 7-11 on your own. (The amount of alcohol you include in your celebratory drink is between you and your maker.


July 11, 1936 -
The Looney Tunes short, Porky's Pet, directed by Jack King, and starring Porky Pig, was released on this date.



A sign in the station invites travellers to stop at the Millar Manor, a nod to the short's writer, Marvin Millar.


July 11, 1942 -
A classic 40s Merrie Melodies cartoon, Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid was released on this date.



The part where Bugs and Killer are temporarily fooled into thinking that the bones are theirs is a reference to a Harold Lloyd film, The Freshman.


July 11, 1942 -
The Looney Tunes short, Wacky Blackout, directed by Bob Clampett, was released on this date.



Thurl Ravenscourt, who would go on to bring cereal mascot Tony the Tiger to TV screens everywhere, is featured here, along with the future Betty Rubble, Bea Benaderet.


July 11, 1965 -
One of the 60s best Beach movies, Beach Blanket Bingo opened today.



In the scene where Don Rickles is doing his comedy routine, everyone in the club is laughing, except Buster Keaton (who can be seen in the background) indicating that he didn't think Rickles was particularly funny (and didn't realize he was in view of the camera).


July 11, 1969 -
The Rolling Stones released Honky Tonk Women on this date.



In this song, Mick Jagger sings about having a go with two different honky tonk women. The first is a "gin-soaked, bar-room queen in Memphis" - likely a prostitute. The second is a "divorcée in New York City." Jagger would sometimes introduce it as being "a song for all the whores in the audience."


July 11, 1969 -
Co-incidentally, David Bowie, released his single Space Oddity, supposedly in conjunction with the July 20th Apollo 11 moon landing, on this date.



In 1980, Bowie released a follow-up to this called Ashes To Ashes, where Major Tom once again makes contact with Earth. He says he is happy in space, but Ground Control comes to the conclusion that he is a junkie.


July 11, 1970 -
Three Dog Night started a two-week run at No.1 in the US with their version of the Randy Newman song Mama Told Me Not To Come, which was also a No.3 hit in the UK.



The song was first covered by Eric Burdon on his first solo album in 1966 and gave Tom Jones & Stereophonics a No.4 hit on the UK Singles Chart in 2000.


July 11, 1983 -
Reading Rainbow, hosted by Levar Burton premiered on PBS on this date



While developing the show, the creators of Reading Rainbow met with Fred Rogers and Joan Ganz Cooney of Sesame Street and The Electric Company fame to find out how to make more engaging television programming.


July 11, 1990 -
For some reason 20th Century Fox released The Adventures of Ford Fairlane directed by Renny Harlin and starring Andrew Dice Clay, on this date. The film was both a commercial and critical failure.



Billy Idol was cast as Smiley, but had to pull out of the role after a nearly-fatal motorcycle accident. Renny Harlin personally asked Robert Englund, who had previously worked with him on A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master, to take over the role after Idol's accident.


July 11, 1997 -
The under-rated Robert Zemeckis Sci-Fi film (based on a Carl Sagan novel,) Contact, starring Jodie Foster, Matthew McConaughey, James Woods, Tom Skerritt, John Hurt, Angela Bassett, Rob Lowe, and David Morse, opened on this date.



The remark made throughout the movie by different characters, that if humans were the only life in the universe, it would "be a terrible waste of space", is a famous quote by author Carl Sagan. It references a statement by the Scottish essayist Thomas Carlyle, considering the potential worlds of other stars; "A sad spectacle. If they be inhabited, what a scope for misery and folly. If they be not inhabited, what a waste of space."

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


Today in History:
July 11, 1533 –
The Church of England came into being on this date. The story of its origins is shrouded in sex and therefore historically important.

Henry VIII ascended to the English throne in 1509, an energetic young man of seventeen. He immediately decided he needed a male heir. This became the enduring theme of his reign, and he consequently came to be known as the Son King—or, to his detractors, the Heir Head.



Henry was such a devout Catholic that he earned the title Defender of the Faith without even stepping into the ring. His first wife, whom he'd married before becoming king, was Catherine of Aragon, who earned the nickname "Catherine of Aragon." Catherine made an excellent queen until she failed to produce a son, at which point her job performance was reevaluated.



By the 1530s, Henry had decided he was married to the wrong queen. Now around forty, he did what many middle-aged men do - he got himself a convertible couch and a new wife.

The couch caused no controversy. The new wife, however, required official permission from the Pope, who - being Catholic - declined to authorize a divorce.

Henry divorced Catherine anyway, and on July 11, 1533, the Catholic Church effectively seceded from the Church of England in retaliation.



With the Pope having stormed off, Henry appointed himself head of the Church of England. Still the Defender of the Faith, he penned the Act of Supremacy, a bold legal document proving that the Church of England was better than the Catholic Church, that Henry was better than the Pope, and that a single white king was back on the market.

Sir Thomas More, then Lord Chancellor and one of Henry's closest confidants, refused to swear to the Act of Supremacy. On July 6, 1535, he was promoted to the rank of Sir Thomas Somewhat Less.

From this point forward, Henry began marrying and divorcing women on a near-sporting basis. The divorce process was now much more efficient, having removed the pesky bottleneck of papal approval. In fact, Henry turned the whole affair into a kind of royal game: each wife would be blindfolded and asked to produce a male heir.



This practice came to be known as Bluff King Hal, and centuries later it served as the inspiration for the popular French game Hungry Hungry Guillotine.


July 11 1804 -



Former Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton and sitting Vice President Aaron Burr duel in Weehawken, New Jersey after Hamilton allegedly slandered Burr during a political dinner in New York. Hamilton was shot in the liver and died the next day.



Meanwhile, Burr lives on to finish his term in office and is eventually tried for treason after attempting to raise an army and seize land for himself, either in Mexico or the Louisiana Territory., but that's another story.


July 11, 1859 -
Charles Dickens' novel, A Tale of Two Cities was published on this date.



The book, would become the best-selling, original English language novel of all time, with more than 200 million copies sold.


July 11, 1893 -
Japanese businessman Kokichi Mikimoto perfected his technique for creating hemispherical cultured pearls, producing the world's first cultured pearl on this day.



In the next 12 years, he would hone his technique, making spherical pearls that were indistinguishable from the perfect specimens rarely found in nature.


July 11, 1936 -
The Triborough Bridge in New York City was opened to traffic, on this date.



Built at the height of the Great Depression, the creation of the Triborough Bridge put thousands of struggling people to work. It also was New York City's first bridge specifically designed for automobiles.


July 11, 1937 -
I want to say at once that I frankly believe that Irving Berlin is the greatest songwriter that has ever lived.... His songs are exquisite cameos of perfection, and each one of them is as beautiful as its neighbor. Irving Berlin remains, I think, America's Schubert.











Jacob Gershowitz, one of the greatest writers of the American songbook, died of a brain tumor at age 38 in Beverly Hills, California on this date.


July 11, 1960 -
The novel To Kill a Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee (the book is her only published work, until recently) was published, on this date.



The novel quickly became a classic and won the Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1961.


July 11, 1979 -
The derelict space station Skylab finally returned to Earth, ignominiously breaking into 500 separate fragments which are swallowed by the Indian Ocean. That was, except for the ones which crashed into Woorlba Sheep Station, near Balladonia in Western Australia.



Shortly thereafter, President Jimmy Carter telephoned the prime minister of that country to apologized for scattering NASA litter on his nation.

Oops. (Leading up to the event, Electric Light Orchestra took out ads in trade magazines dedicating their new single, Don't Bring Me Down, to Skylab.)


July 11, 1997 -
Bodybuilder and wannabe actor Jonathan Norman was arrested for trespassing on Steven Spielberg's estate in Malibu, California on this date. Believing that the film director "wanted to be raped," Norman had brought along a kit containing handcuffs, duct tape, nipple clamps, chloroform, and a stun gun.

I never realized that Steven liked nipple clamps, he seemed more like a butt plug man to me. And I'd like to think he enjoys ACME Warming Bung Balm.



And so it goes.