Tuesday, October 6, 2020

Perhaps the secret spices came from Aberdeen

Other things to occupy your mind with other than COVID-19 - I know this may seem blasphemous but fried chicken originated in Scotland.



It was a Scottish tradition from the Middle Ages to deep fry chicken. The Scottish had a preference for food that had been cooked in fat rather than boiled like the English did. Additionally, fried food was cheaper and quicker to make. The Scots bought this dish over to the Americas with them when immigrating to the Southern United States where it became a staple of American cuisine.


Today is Mad Hatter's Day. The Mad Hatter wore a top hat on the front of which a slip of paper with reads "10/6."



(Except since the Mad Hatter lived in England, 10/6 might refer to June 10th - but I'm not going there.)


October 6, 1927 -
Good, bad or indifferent to it, The Jazz Singer (the first feature-length movie with audible synchronized dialogue), premiered in NYC on this date.



Al Jolson's famous line (as Jack Robin) "You ain't heard nothin' yet." was an ad-lib. The intention was that the film should only have synchronized music, not speech, but Jolson dropped in the line (which he used in his stage act) after the song Dirty Hands, Dirty Face. The director wisely left it in.


In the late 40s through the 50s, the CIA led a top secret campaign, called Militant Liberty that encouraged studios to insert the theme of freedom into Hollywood movies. Alfred P. Sloan (think about the name and it will come to you) the recently retired head of of General Motors from 1923 to 1946, was recruited to head the cause. Sloan hired George Stewart Benson, president of Harding College to produce a series of cartoons to promote anti-Communist, pro-free enterprise themes.



Make Mine Freedom (1948) was one of the first. At least three Warner Bros. cartoons during the period, Heir Conditioned, By Word of Mouse, and Yankee Dood It were probably produced under this program. And the famous Duck and Cover as well as Disney's Our Friend the Atom have the fingerprints of the program all over them. (We don't even have time to discuss the CIA's involvement with the live action studios during the time.)


October 6, 1963 -
The wonderful adaption of the classic 18th Century novel, Tom Jones premiered in NYC on this date. (Bizarre piece of trivia: this was the last film that John F. Kennedy saw before his assassination.)



It took three hours to shoot the famous eating scene, in which Tom Jones and Mrs. Waters express their lust for each other by tearing into a huge feast. Buckets were conveniently placed out of camera range to accommodate the actors, who kept throwing up from all the eating.


October 6, 1965 -
The Supremes single I Hear a Symphony went to No. 1 on this date.



This was written by the songwriting team of Holland-Dozier-Holland, who wrote five consecutive #1 hits for The Supremes, starting with Where Did Our Love Go. Their next single was Nothing But Heartaches, which brought the streak to an end when it peaked at #11, but they went right back to the top with the next one, I Hear A Symphony.


October 6, 1976 -
The song, Disco Duck by Rick Dees and His Cast of Idiots received a gold record on this date. The song was featured in the movie Saturday Night Fever but was not included on its soundtrack album.



According to Dees, the voice of the duck was provided by a guy he met at the gym who could pull it off. This was Kenneth Pruitt, who sued Dees after the song became a hit, claiming he was paid just $188 for his services, which included dressing up in a duck suit to promote the song on various TV appearances and on a walk through Times Square in New York City. It's likely that the suit was settled and Pruitt ordered to keep quiet - he has not been heard from.


October 6, 1978 -
Alan Parker's harrowing drama, Midnight Express starring Brad Davis, Randy Quaid and John Hurt, premiered in the US on this date.



Although the movie is based on a true story, it has been indicated by Billy Hayes twenty years after its release, that what is presented in the movie is a very exaggerated version of what happened to him in the prison in Istanbul, Turkey.


October 6, 1992 -
28 years ago, R.E.M. released their eighth studio album, Automatic for the People, on this date.



The album title was inspired by Weaver D's soul food diner in Athens, Georgia. When you ordered food there, they answered by saying "automatic." They had a sign that said "Delicious Fine Foods - Automatic For The People."


Today's moment of Zen


Today in History
:
Today is Armed Forces Day in Egypt (we'll get back to Armed Forces Day in a moment but it's not in celebration of the Elvis Costello album) and Ivy Day in Ireland. (Ivy Day is not a horticultural celebration. The date marks the anniversary of the 1891 death of Irish nationalist Charles Stewart Parnell;



Irish favoring home rule traditionally pin a bit of ivy to their lapels in his honor.


Ivy Day should not be confused with I.V. Day, celebrated only by drips.)


Aeschylus was the first Greek playwright to produce tragedies as we would know them today, but that's not important to our story today.



According to legend, Aeschylus died when an eagle, mistaking his bald head for a stone, dropped a tortoise on it, killing him instantly on this date in 456 BC (that was tragedy for Aeschylus but it's comedy to us.)


October 6, 1014 -
Czar Samuil of Bulgaria died of a heart attach after an army of 15,000 of his men returned, blinded by his enemy Emperor Basil of the Byzantine Empire. One out of every hundred of his men was permitted to keep one eye, such that they were able to return home.


For this victory Basil earned the title Bulgaroctonus, slayer of Bulgars.

I guess we shouldn't complain.


October 6 is the anniversary of one of the greatest moments in the history of literary criticism. It was on that date in 1536 that William Tyndale was recognized for his important contribution to world literature, the first translation of the New Testament into English - by being tied to the stake, strangled, and his dead body then burnt.



Ah, when men were men, women were women, and critics were murderous, torch-wielding fanatics!


October 6, 1966
-
LSD was declared illegal in the US on this date.



Hopefully you timed your intake accordingly.


October 6, 1973 -
In a surprise attack on the Jewish highest holiday of Yom Kippur - Syrian and Egyptian armies invaded Israel on this date, starting, what became known as, the Yom Kippur War. The US came to Israel's aid, but as Israel began winning the war, Israel wouldn't back down from the siege brought on by the Egyptian troops to the south.



The Soviet Union threatened to intervene on Egypt's behalf, causing high tensions between the US and Soviet Union that caused lasting damage to the relationship between two. Eventually, all parties came to a peace agreement.


October 6, 1976 -
During a televised debate on this date, President and candidate Gerald Ford asserts that there was 'no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe'.



Ford lost the election. (I believe the White House is trying to use the corollary, 'there was no Russian collusion in the election', from his playbook.)
 

October 6, 1981 -
During Armed Forces Day (commemorating Egypt's participation in the Arab-Israeli War,) armed gunmen leapt from a truck and began shooting into the reviewing stand at Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.



The assassination had been approved by Omar Abdel-Rahman, a cleric later convicted in the US for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.



And so it goes.


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