Today is America Recycles Day

We should all celebrate today, although it should be called National Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day today.

Please don't hate me for what you may be served for dinner tonight.


November 15, 1935 -
"... I saw Mrs. Claypool first. Of course, her mother really saw her first but there's no point in bringing the Civil War into this. "

The Marx Brother's first film made without Zeppo, A Night at the Opera, premiered on this date.



Sam Wood, the director of this film, was a perfectionist. The scene in which Harpo Marx hangs from the rope was filmed so many times that Harpo's hands became cut and swollen from the rope. Marx did many of his own stunts. He later said it was a silly thing for a 47-year-old non-stuntman to have done.


November 15, 1940 -
The film that introduced Abbott and Costello to movie audiences, One Night in the Tropics, opened on this date.



Bud Abbott and Lou Costello were big radio stars when they made this, their debut film. Their voices are heard before they appear on screen.


November 15, 1945 -
The beautifully lyrical, Les Enfants du Paradis, opened in the US on this date.



This involved building the largest studio set in the then history of French cinema - the quarter mile of street frontage, reproduced in scrupulous detail, representing the Boulevard du Crime, the theater district of Paris in the 1830s and 40s. This would have been a daunting prospect at the best of times but in Vichy France, when all artisans, transport, materials, costumes and film stock were all in short supply, it was a miraculous achievement.


November 15, 1956 -
Elvis Presley's first movie, Love Me Tender, premiered at New York's Paramount Theater on this date.



The film was produced by 20th Century-Fox but the premiere was at the Paramount Theater on Broadway in New York City. Thousands of fans were outside the building on the night of premiere. A huge paperboard with the image of Elvis Presley was on the outside of the building.


Today in History:
November 15, 1539 -
The Bishop of Glastonbury, Richard Whiting, was hung, drawn and quartered on Glastonbury Tor after being convicted of treason (on a trumped up charge) of remaining loyal to Rome on this date.

The Abbot's head was stuck on a spike above his abbey gateway for all to see, and his quarters, boiled in pitch, were displayed at neighboring monasteries.

Here's a fact to impress your friends with:
One interpretation of the children's nursery rhyme Little Jack Horner relates it to Jack Horner, steward to the Abbot of Glastonbury Abbey, Richard Whiting. Supposedly, the abbot sent Horner to London to present a pie to Henry VIII with the deeds to 12 manors inside. During the journey, Horner opened the pie and took the deed to Mells (it being the real 'plum' of the twelve manors), which was indeed acquired by the family at that time, although they claim that it was purchased legitimately.


November 15, 1660 -
Asser Levy (one of the first Jewish citizens to come to New Amsterdam) became the first kosher butcher licensed in NYC (New Amsterdam) on this date.

Later that day, a Mrs. Yetta Abromowicz is the first customer to ask how fresh the chicken was.


Today in 1864 -
Union General William T. Sherman began his March to the Sea and burnt Atlanta on this date.



Meanwhile in another part of Atlanta, Rhett rescues Scarlett, Melanie and her brand new baby from Aunt Pittypat's Peachtree Street home before the conflagration began.

Rhett declared his love for Scarlett but she rebuffed him.



But that's a another story.


November 15, 1887 -
American artist Georgia O'Keeffe was born on this date.



Ms. O'Keeffe is best known for her colorful paintings of desert flowers -



that don't look like vaginas.


November 15, 1939 -
Perhaps because it was the depth of the Great Depression, the perversion of Washington DC, knew no bounds -

President Roosevelt, slowly but deliberately rose from his wheelchair and laid the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C., in front a group of horrified dignitaries, on this date


November 15, 1940 -
The Queens–Midtown Tunnel linking Manhattan and Queens opens to traffic on this date.

Some of those first drivers have just made it out to Montauk.


November 15, 1959 -
In Holcomb, Kansas, Richard Hickock and Perry Smith brutally killed four members of the Herbert Clutter Family on this date.



This crime was memorably recounted by Truman Capote in his famous non-fiction story, In Cold Blood.



And so it goes.


There are 14 days until Thanksgiving and the start of Hanukkah.
There are 40 days until Christmas.