Today is the 12th World Gin Day, always celebrated on the second Saturday in June, (National Martini Day is coming up on Friday, June 19 - I will just have to pace myself!).
(As always, please celebrate responsibly.)
It's the feast day of Saint Anthony of Padua. One of the most beloved of saints, his images and statues are ubiquitous. Proclaimed a Doctor of the Church on January 16, 1946, he is sometimes called the Evangelical Doctor.
While it may be hard to be a saint in the city, the people of Beaumont, Texas take comfort in having a saint to pray to.
June 13, 1941 -
Fritz Lang wartime thriller, Man Hunt, starring Walter Pidgeon, Joan Bennett, George Sanders, John Carradine and Roddy McDowall premiered in NYC on this date.
This was one of several films mentioned in the September 1941 Senate subcommittee hearings on Propaganda in Motion Pictures, where isolationist Senators Nye, Clark and Wheeler attacked Hollywood for "war-mongering." Senator Nye, who testified before the committee, had not seen most of the films mentioned. The subcommittee did not reconvene due to the attack on Pearl Harbor in December.
June 13, 1952 -
The seventh collaboration of Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, Pat and Mike, was released on this date.
The husband and wife writing team of Garson Kanin and Ruth Gordon were close friends of Hepburn and Tracy. They wrote this script especially for them to capture the essence of their real-life personalities and relationship as well as to showcase Hepburn's athletic abilities. Tracy really was cranky but lovable and Hepburn really was a terrific athlete. She was excellent at golf and one of the best tennis players in Hollywood.
June 13, 1962 -
Stanley Kubrick's take on Vladimir Nabokov's controversial novel, Lolita, premiered on this date.
Stanley Kubrick held a special screening for Vladimir Nabokov a few days before the film's premiere. It was at this time the author learned that most of his screenplay had been jettisoned, but he reported himself very happy with the finished picture, praising Kubrick, and the cast.
June 13, 1970 –
The Beatles song, The Long and Winding Road becomes their last U.S. number one hit on this date.
The Beatles recorded this in January 1969 as a fairly simple ballad. By 1970, The Beatles were breaking up and and Phil Spector was brought in to go through the tapes and produce the album. Spector was known for his "Wall Of Sound" recording technique, where he added many instruments and layered the tracks to create a very full sound. On this track, he took out most of The Beatles instruments and added a string section and choir (The Mike Sammes Singers). The result was very different from what the group originally had in mind.
Even though he wrote this song, Paul McCartney didn't go to the sessions where Spector produced it. When McCartney heard the results, he made it clear that he hated what Spector did to his song, and tried to get the original version, which was mixed by engineer Glyn Johns, on the album. The band was already falling apart, and this caused further turmoil within the group, as Harrison and Lennon both supported Spector. Paul has not changed his stance over the years, and still believes Spector butchered it.
June 13, 1970 -
The Mungo Jerry song, In The Summertime hit #1 in UK, on this date.
Barry Murray, a producer at Pye Records, was a friend of Ray Dorset's (the group's lead singer and guitarist) and signed the group to the label's more adventurous imprint, Dawn Records, which released In The Summertime as their first single. The song took off, going to #1 in their native UK and making #3 in America. The UK fortunes of the song were aided by the group's appearance at the Hollywood Music Festival in Staffordshire England on May 23, 1970, shortly after the song was released. Playing on low on a bill with the Grateful Dead, Black Sabbath, Free and Traffic, the song got the attention of the 35,000 or so fans in attendance, giving it a huge lift.
Today in History:
June 13, 1381 -
In Medieval England, the famous Wat Tyler's Rebellion began, on this date.
Since most of you reading this don't live in England, most of you don't give a damn.
June 13, 1865 –
In case the should come up in conversation today -
William Butler Yeats, Irish poet and dramatist, and one of the foremost figures in 20th century literature, was born on this date. He won the Nobel Prize in 1923.
He was brother of the artist Jack Butler Yeats, the son of John Butler Yeats, and along with J. M. Synge and Sean O'Casey, was one of the driving forces behind the Irish Literary Revival. Together with Lady Gregory and Edward Martyn, he founded Abbey Theatre, and served as its chief playwright.
June 13, 1886 -
The recently-deposed monarch of Bavaria wasn't having a great day today.
That afternoon, the bodies of the King and his physician, Dr. Gudden, were discovered floating face-down in Lake Starnberg.
It's always a problem when you're the King of Bavaria and your family can't accept your active sodomy lifestyle.
June 13, 1917 -
18 German Gotha bomber planes flew over London in the first aerial bombardment in history (not counting Zeppelins). They were met by over 90 British fighters, but not one Gotha was brought down. This bombing raid caused 162 deaths.
On June 13, 1990, East Germany began officially tearing down the Berlin Wall. The date apparently has some significance in the Teutonic psyche.
June 13, 1920 -
The United States Postal Service ruled that children may not be sent via Parcel Post on this date. Before that, children had been clogging the mail chutes of America.
June 13, 1934 -
Two months before becoming Fuhrer, Hitler meets Mussolini in Venice. Unfortunately, Mussolini refuses to have an interpreter and his German was not good, so neither man could understand the other.
After a midnight gondola ride (or two), Mussolini began to refer to the German leader as "a silly little monkey."
June 13, 1966 -
In 1963, Ernesto Miranda was accused and convicted of abduction and rape due to a seemingly coerced confession that he later recanted. The Supreme Court determined on this date in Miranda v. Arizona, that all criminals must be informed of their rights before interrogation. This evolved into the standard language provided in a Miranda warning
The Supreme Court overturned his conviction, but he was retried and convicted again in 1966. He was released from prison in 1972 and later stabbed to death in a men's room at a bar where he was playing poker in 1976.
June 13, 1971 -
Next to the White House wedding photo of President Nixon's daughter Tricia, the New York Times ran its first story on the Pentagon Papers, a top secret DoD analysis authored by the RAND Corporation detailing every mistake and deception made during the 30-year history of the Vietnam War.
Attorney General John Mitchell manages to block any further publication of the embarrassing documents, but the court order is countermanded two weeks later in a Supreme Court decision. (Once again, I am reminded (by a very loyal bunkie) of a quote, attributed to Tom Lehrer, about John Mitchell: If you like John Mitchell, you'll love Ed Meese.)
And so it goes.
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