Today's presidential trivia

A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties.



Harry S. Truman (1945 - 1953) would get up at 5:00 AM so he could practice the piano for two hours.


September 7, 1954 -
Roberto Rossellini's masterpiece, Journey to Italy (Viaggio in Italia,) starring Ingrid Bergman and George Sanders, is released on this date.



George Sanders, in his 1960 autobiography, wrote at length about the making of this film, which he found an exasperating and unpleasant experience. He spoke witheringly about Roberto Rossellini, whom he characterized as being more interested in scuba-diving than in film-making. Although the tone of his remarks is one of amusement, it became known that Sanders (who had admired earlier Rossellini films) had been deeply affected by exposure to a style of film-making quite foreign to his previous experience, and had spent the shoot feeling frustrated and angry, often bursting into uncontrollable tears.


September 7, 1963 -
The first animated cartoon series to be imported from Japan, Astro Boy was broadcast on NBC-TV on this date.



Although originally intended only for the US airings of the show, the name "Astro Boy" proved to be popular among Japanese viewers as well, and so the names "Astro Boy" and "Tetsuwan Atomu" are interchangeable in Japan.


September 7, 1967 -
The Flying Nun, starring Sally Field as a nun who finds that she can fly, debuted on ABC-TV on this date.



Sally Field has admitted that she is embarrassed by her work in this series. She didn't want the role, but her stepfather, Jock Mahoney, convinced her to accept it for job security.


September 7, 1968 –
The Banana Splits Adventure Hour (which only lasted 31 episodes,) starring Bingo, Drooper, Fleegle, and Snorky, premiered on NBC, on this date.



One of the composers employed to write the songs "performed" by the Banana Splits was future R&B legend Barry White. (I'm apologizing in advance for the ear worm.)


September 7, 1979 -
ESPN, the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network, made its debut on cable TV.



The first program on the air, Sports Center lasted a half-hour, consisting mainly of videotaped highlights and following its conclusion that night, the network aired a slow-pitch softball game along with other programming, including wrestling and college soccer.


September 7, 1985 -
David Bowie and Mick Jagger's cover of the Martha Reeves and The Vandellas 1964 hit Dancing In The Street hit No.1 on the UK singes chart, on this date



Bowie and Jagger had originally planned to perform the song together at the 1985 Live Aid concerts via a satellite link-up, with Bowie performing at Wembley Stadium in London and Jagger at John F. Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia. This proved technically unfeasible because there would be a four-second delay, and neither Jagger or Bowie was willing to mime the song.


September 7, 1987 -
Pink Floyd released their first album without founding member Roger Waters, A Momentary Lapse of Reason, in the UK, on this date.



Pink Floyd had split up in 1983 after releasing the album The Final Cut. In 1985, Waters told their record company he was done with the band, which he thought would retire Pink Floyd. It didn't. The following year, David Gilmour and drummer Nick Mason reinstated keyboard player Rick Wright as a full member (Waters demoted him to session man) and announced they would be continuing as Pink Floyd. Waters tried to stop them, but his legal efforts failed. Convinced the album would fail, he sniped at his former bandmates in the press, wondering how they could make anything of value without him.


Today's moment of Zen


Today in History:
September 7, 1533 -
Elizabeth I was born on on this date. She was crowned at 25 and remained on the throne for 44 years, which helps explain why she remained a virgin all her life.



She is best known for having ordered the destruction of the Spanish Armadillo and the invention of Shakespeare.


September 7, 1915 -
Former-cartoonist Johnny Gruelle received a patent (US patent #47,789) his Raggedy Ann doll on this date.

Gruelle created Raggedy Ann for his daughter, Marcella, when she brought him an old hand-made rag doll and he drew a face on it. From his bookshelf, he pulled a book of poems by James Whitcomb Riley, and combined the names of two poems, The Raggedy Man and Little Orphant Annie. He said, "Why don’t we call her Raggedy Ann?"


September 7, 1927 -



Philo T. Farnsworth (all of 21 years old) succeeded in transmitting an image through purely electronic means by using an image dissector on this date. He used an "image dissector" (the first television camera tube) to convert the image into a current, and an "image oscillite" (picture tube) to receive it.



When the simple image of a straight line was placed between the image dissector and a carbon arc lamp, it showed up clearly on the receiver in another room. His first tele-electronic image was transmitted on a glass slide at his laboratory at 202 Green Street in San Francisco.


It's the birthday of singer and songwriter Charles Hardin "Buddy" Holly, born in Lubbock, Texas, on this date in 1936. By the age of 13, Holly was playing what he called "Western Bop" at local clubs. He was 19 when an agent discovered him and signed him to a contract with Decca Records.



The following year, Holly returned to Lubbock and, with three friends, formed The Crickets, who then released That' ll Be The Day, which sold over a million copies. Buddy Holly's career was short: He died in February of 1959 in a plane crash in northern Iowa. Soon after, an English band that admired The Crickets decided to call themselves The Beatles.


September 7, 1940 -
Nazi Germany began its initial blitz on London during the World War II Battle of Britain on this date. The German Luftwaffe blitzed London for the first of 57 consecutive nights on this date. Germany launched the aerial bombing of London that Adolf Hitler believed would soften Britain for an invasion.



The invasion, "Operation Sea Lion," never materialized. The Luftwaffe lost 41 bombers over England. The blitz only strengthened Britain's resistance. The defense of London was for the Royal Air Force what Churchill called "their finest hour."


September 7, 1978 -
Keith Moon, drummer for The Who, died in his London residence from an overdose of chlormethiazole edisylate, a prescription drug used to treat alcoholism.



Moon's flat, #12 Curzon Place, was the same spot where Cass Elliot died of a heart attack in 1974 (and not from choking on a ham sandwich, smarty pants.)


September 7, 1978 -
Walking to the bus stop, BBC journalist Georgi Markov suddenly felt a sharp pain in his right calf. A KGB assassin had jabbed him with an umbrella tip, rigged to inject a tiny platinum sphere. The pellet is laden with ricin, a castor-based toxin with no known antidote. Markov died in the hospital four agonizing days later.



Oh those wacky KGB agents.


September 7, 1996 -
Standing up through the open sunroof of a BMW 750 sedan, rap artist Tupac Shakur was talking to some women at a Las Vegas street intersection when a white Cadillac pulls alongside. Gunfire erupts, and Shakur was shot four times. He died in the hospital a week later.



Although quite dead, or so we are led to believe, he still has quite impression record sales.


September 7, 2003 -
... I missed jazz, kind of. And by the time I came to it in life, it was too intimidating to enjoy thoroughly.



Warren Zevon, Grammy Award-winning American rock singer-songwriter and musician, died at age 56, on this date.



And so it goes.