Off with your head

Today is National Beheading Day, one of the long list of make believe holidays that litter the internet. I'm very close to convincing the board of directors of ACME to become the main corporate sponsor.



So remember to wish your friends and neighbors Happy National Beheading Day. Enjoy the odd look they give you.


September 2, 1950 -
Here, watch your language, bud. We're on the air.

Here is one of my favorite non Bug Bunny Looney Tunes. The classic Daffy/ Porky outing, The Ducksters, was released on this date.



On the game show Porky Pig wins:
1. The Rocky Mountains
2. A 17 - Jewel half Nelson
3. The La Brea Tar Pits
4. The Rock of Gibraltar
5. 600 gallons of genuine Niagara Falls
6. $26,000,000.03


September 2, 1965 -
The Rolling Stones appeared on the British TV show Ready Steady Go! on this date.



The boys all joined in a parody of Sonny & Cher's I Got You Babe.

Oh those scalawags!


Today in History -
Phidippides of Athens sets out on his famous run that inspired the Marathon on this date in 490 BC

(we'll catch up with this fool-hearty soul later.)


September 2, 1666 -
Thomass Farrinor forgot to put out his oven at the end of his shift, on this date.



Unfortunately, the resulting fire cost him his job as official baker to King Charles II of England and started the Great Fire of London. (Quite surprisingly, only six people 'officially' were declared dead because of the fire. To remember the fire, the city of London erected a monument. Six people have committed suicide by jumping off of it, and two have fallen accidentally to their deaths. You might hear this fun fact repeated on tours or forums: more people have died from falling off the monument than died in the fire. But it's not true - more like several hundred and quite possibly several thousand; very poor people likely died in the fire, burnt so beyond recognition (and not on the 'official radar') that their remains were not counted.



On the plus side, it burned out of control and destroyed four-fifths of London, thereby ending the Black Plague.


Lydia Kamekeha Liliuokalani was born on this date in 1838.

Upon the death of her brother in 1891, she became sovereign Queen of Hawaii. This was considered posing by the American colonials of Hawaii, who reminded her that monarchy was unconstitutional in the United States.



She reminded them that Hawaii was not part of the United States. This was more than unconstitutional: it was cheeky.



She was immediately deposed, then wrote wrote Aloha Oe and retired; spending the rest of her life, unsuccessfully suing the United States for illegally ceasing her island nation.

(Were I the president, I would have hesitated showing my birth certificate.)


September 2, 1901 -
Twelve days before the assassination of President William McKinley, Vice President Theodore Roosevelt offered the advice, "Speak softly and carry a big stick," in a speech at the Minnesota State Fair on this date.



Roosevelt described his style of foreign policy as "the exercise of intelligent forethought and of decisive action sufficiently far in advance of any likely crisis."


USS Shenandoah was the first of four United States Navy rigid airships. She was built from 1922 to 1923 at Lakehurst Naval Air Station, and first flew in September, 1923. She developed the Navy's experience with rigid airships, even making the first crossing of the North American continent by airship.

On September 2, 1925, Shenandoah departed Lakehurst on a promotional flight to the Midwest which would include flyovers of 40 cities and visits to state fairs. Testing of a new mooring mast at Dearborn, Michigan was included in the schedule.



While passing through an area of thunderstorms and turbulence over Ohio early in the morning of the 3rd, the airship was torn apart and crashed in several pieces near Caldwell, Ohio. Shenandoah's commanding officer, Commander Zachary Lansdowne and 13 other officers and men were killed.


September 2, 1930 -
Capt. Dieudonne Costes and Lt. Maurice Bellonte arrived in Valley Stream, N.Y. from Paris (3,852 miles) in 37 hours and 18 minutes, aboard the Question Mark - the first non-stop westbound fixed wing aircraft flight between Europe and America.



The flight was a commemorative return visit of Lindberg's historical flight to Paris in 1927.


Russ Columbo, was an American singer, violinist and actor, most famous for his signature tune, Prisoner of Love and the legend surrounding his early death.



On September 2, 1934, Columbo was shot under peculiar circumstances by his longtime friend, photographer Lansing Brown. Columbo was visiting him at the studio one day. In lighting a cigarette, Brown lit the match by striking it against the wooden stock of an antique French dueling pistol. The flame set off a long-forgotten charge in the gun, and a lead pistol ball was fired. The pistol ball ricocheted off a nearby table and hit Columbo in the left eye, killing him almost instantly.

Columbo's death was ruled an accident, and Brown exonerated from blame. His funeral mass was attended by numerous Hollywood luminaries, including Bing Crosby and Columbo's fiancée Carole Lombard.

Literally, with friends like this, who needs enemies.


September 2, 1945 -
In front of an assembled group of Allied sailors and officers, General Douglas MacArthur signed documents during the surrender ceremony aboard the USS Missouri on this date.



The unconditional surrender of the Japanese to the Allies officially ended the Second World War six years and a day since it began in Poland back in 1939. (Remember, those Hitler World Tour T-Shirts are still quite valuable.)


September 2, 1969 -
Six weeks after landing men on the Moon, America's first automatic teller machine (ATM), at the time called the Docuteller, made its public debut on this date, dispensing cash to customers at Chemical Bank in Rockville Center, New York.

It marked the first time reusable, magnetically coded cards were used to withdraw cash. Today there are well over 1 million ATMs around the world, with a new one added approximately every five minutes.



And so it goes.