Not that Neil's version was shabby in any way.
November 29, 1940 -
I'm very fond of children. Girl children, around eighteen and twenty.
W.C. Fields at his peak, The Bank Dick, premiered on this date.
Near the beginning of the movie, Egbert Sousé is whistling Listen to the Mockingbird as he & Joe the Bartender enter the bar. Joe is played byShemp Howard of the Three Stooges fame, and Listen to the Mockingbird was the Three Stooges' theme music.
November 29, 1945 -
Remarkable for it frank portrayal of alcoholism (for it's day), The Lost Weekend, opened in Los Angeles on this date.
Studio advisers warned Ray Milland that this would be the death of his career. Milland himself was initially reluctant to take the part, as it had been turned down by many other leading actors of the day. However, Paramount was convinced that the only way they could sell such a film was with a matinée idol in the lead. Billy Wilder acquiesced to this only when it became clear that his first choice, José Ferrer, would not land the part.
November 29, 1950 -
Jean Cocteau's beautifully magical, Orphee, opened in the US on this date.
Orphee's obsession with deciphering hidden messages contained in random radio noise is a direct nod to the coded messages that the BBC concealed in their wartime transmissions for the French Resistance.
Today in History:
November 29, 1777 -
José Joaquín Moraga proved that he knew the way to San Jose on this date,
when he established, for Spain, el Pueblo de San Jose de Guadelupe, the first civil settlement in California.
November 29, 1864 -
The Sand Creek Massacre occurred, on this date, when Colorado volunteers led by Colonel John Chivington, in retaliation for an Indian attack on a party of immigrants near Denver, massacred at least 400 Cheyenne and Arapaho noncombatants (mostly children, women, physically- and mentally-challenged, and elders) inside Colorado Territory.
It also generated two Congressional investigations into the actions of Chivington and his men. The House Committee on the Conduct of the War concluded that Chivington had "deliberately planned and executed a foul and dastardly massacre which would have disgraced the varied and savage among those who were the victims of his cruelty."
The American Government has so much to be proud of with their dealings with the Native Americans.
November 29, 1929 -
Navy Lt. Cmdr. Richard E. Byrd (on a break from his experiments with frozen vegetables) radioed that he'd made the first airplane flight with pilot Floyd Bennett, over the South Pole: "My calculations indicate that we have reached vicinity of South Pole."
After briefly loitering around the Pole, Byrd and his crew headed back to their home base, Little America and more intense testing of frozen zucchini.
November 29, 1951 -
The United States set off the first underground nuclear explosion named "Uncle" at Frenchman Flats in Nevada on this date.
It was a great success, except for the giant spiders, ants, grasshoppers and other insects left in the aftermath.
November 29, 1961 -
The US sends the chimpanzee Enos into space, on the Mercury Atlas 5 capsule from Cape Canaveral.
Enos returns to earth safely but dies less than a year later before he can sign with the William Morris Agency.
November 29, 1986 -
82 year old Archibald Leach, better known as Cary Grant, died on this date.
While rumors of Grant's sexuality had been around for years, consider in perspective the words of US congressman Bob Dornan, spoken on the House floor: "I do not think Cary Grant was a homosexual or bisexual. He just got carried away at those orgies."
I love that quote.
November 29, 2001 -
The "quiet" Beatle George Harrison silenced by cancer on this date.
And on a personal note:
Oh yeah, millions of years ago (or at least more than half a century ago) the earth cooled and formed a hard crust, huge dinosaurs ruled the land and John was there to see it all. Happy Birthday John.
About a decade later, vast plains with wildflowers sprung up and Mary skipped along them all. Happy Birthday Mary.
21 more shopping days until Hanukkah, 26 more shopping days until Christmas.
And so it goes
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