Wednesday, October 14, 2020

Another great bar bet

Other things to occupy your mind with other than COVID-19 - The pH scale was invented by the Carlsberg brewery.



It was the brainchild of one Søren Sørensen who invented it in 1909 while researching the best proteins, amino acids and enzymes in the Carlsberg brewery laboratory.


Anyone can be confident with a full head of hair. But a confident bald man - there's your diamond in the rough. - Larry David



Today is Be Bald and Free day!


October 14, 1888 -
French inventor Louis Le Prince shot a brief film which lasted for about two seconds, in Leeds, England, he called Roundhay Garden Scene, on this date.



The footage is thought to be the oldest surviving film footage in world history.


October 14, 1953 -
Possibly the ultimate film noir, Fritz Lang's The Big Heat opens in NYC on this date.



Bannion's wife Katie is played by Jocelyn Brando, older sister of Marlon Brando.


October 14, 1954 -
Michael Curtiz’s
holiday musical White Christmas starring Bing Crosby, Rosemary Clooney, Vera Ellen, and Danny Kaye premiered in New York City on this date



Although Dean Jagger was made out to be the "old man" in the film, Bing Crosby was actually six months older than Dean in real life.


October 14, 1972 -
Last Tango in Paris, starring Marlon Brando, Maria Schneider and that infamous stick of butter premiered in New York City, on this date.



According to his autobiography Brando: Songs My Mother Taught Me, the reason why Marlon Brando refused to do a full frontal nude scene was because his "penis shrank to the size of a peanut on set."


October 14, 1972 -
The TV-series Kung Fu, starring David Carridine, debuted on ABC-TV on this date.



The only reason this show went off the air was because David Carradine quit the series. He had sustained so many injuries, he felt he could not go on. The show got high ratings for all three seasons that it aired.


October 14, 1978 -
The gang finally got off the damn island (sort of) when the first TV movie from a TV series, Rescue from Gilligan's Island, premiered on CBS-TV with all of the original cast except Tina Louise (who wanted too much money,) on this date.



The scene in which the rescued castaways are towed into harbor to a hero's welcome was filmed in Los Angeles' Marina Del Rey. According to Sherwood Schwartz, the extras hired to play the crowd were soon joined by countless onlookers, all of them ecstatic to see the familiar characters finally rescued. The crowd's enthusiasm was so overwhelming that the cast members were moved to tears.


Another failed ACME Product


Today in History:
October 14, 430 BC -



October 14, 1066 -
As bad as King Harold's day yesterday; today was worse, much worse. The King and his army were locked in a massive battle and faced Duke William, William the Conqueror, and his mounted knights near the town of Hastings.



Duke William planned a three point attack plan that included a) heavy archery b) attack by foot soldiers c) attack by mounted knights at any weak point of defense. The Normans routed the Saxons and won out after Harold was killed by a stray arrow. This placed William on the throne of England. There is nothing worse than losing the throne of England to a stray arrow which appears to have happened far more frequently than thought.


October 14, 1651 -
Massachusetts passed laws prohibiting the poor from dressing excessively, on this date.


It was felt that persons of limited means should save their money and learn to get by with simple vinaigrettes.


October 14, 1893 -
The older I get, the more I believe in what I can't explain or understand, even more than the things that are explainable and understandable.



Lillian Diana Gish, was born on this date. Although she was the archetypal silent film heroine, she was a star of movies, television, radio, and the stage for nearly all of the 20th century. She closed her career in the 1987 film The Whales of August.


October 14, 1912 -
Former U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, campaigning for a return to office, was shot in Milwaukee by a saloon keeper named John Schrank on this date.

What saves Teddy was the bullet lodged in Roosevelt's chest only after hitting both his steel eyeglass case and a copy of his speech he was carrying in his jacket. Roosevelt declined suggestions that he go to the hospital, and delivered his scheduled speech.

He spoke vigorously for ninety minutes. His opening comments to the gathered crowd were, "I don't know whether you fully understand that I have just been shot; but it takes more than that to kill a Bull Moose." Afterwards, doctors determined that he was not seriously wounded and that it would be more dangerous to attempt to remove the bullet than to leave it in his chest. Roosevelt carried it with him until he died.



Schrank was captured and uttered the now famous words "any man looking for a third term ought to be shot."

Teddy Roosevelt, one of America's First Superheroes.


October 14, 1944 -
Field Marshal Rommel (James Mason) of Germany was visited by two of Hitler's personal staff on this date in history.



They informed him that he was suspected of involvement in the July 20th plot to assassinate the Fuhrer and that he would therefore be required either to: (a) stand trial and die, or (b) just die. They brought some poison along to facilitate his decision.



Hitler always liked him.


October 14, 1947 -
American pilot Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier in a rocket-powered airplane, on this date. Yeager insisted it was already broken and consequently refused to repair it despite repeated admonitions by his mother.



It remains broken to this day. (The sound barrier should not be confused with the Long Island Sound barrier, sometimes referred to as the Throg's Neck Bridge.)


October 14, 1959 -
Omni-sexual actor and Nazi sympathizer Errol Flynn, dubbed "the most despicable human being yet born" (and that was by a friend), died of a heart attack in Vancouver on this date. Flynn reported didn't have a sexual preference, he merely slept with anything with an orifice (and possibly a pulse) including (but not limited to) Truman Capote, Howard Hughes, as well as countless Hollywood starlets.



Presumably, not at the same time.


October 14, 1962 -
The US collected photographic evidence that the Soviet Union had positioned missiles about 90 miles off the US coast, in Cuba. The missiles were capable of transporting nuclear warheads.



The tense situation that arose in the next two weeks would bring the US and Soviet Union the closest the two countries had ever been to nuclear war


October 14, 1968 -
Captain Walter Schirra, Jr., Major Donn Eisele and Major Walt Cunningham, gave the American public a tour of the spacecraft and showed the view through their craft’s windows on this date.



The crew on NASA's Apollo 7 mission, the first successful manned mission to the Moon, broadcast the first live transmission from their spacecraft.




And so it goes


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