When did it become normal for people to ignore the most basic rules of driving?
March 6, 1942 -
Ernst Lubitsch World War II comedy, To Be or Not to Be, starring Jack Benny, Carole Lombard and Robert Stack premiered on this date.
The biggest problem early in the shoot was Jack Benny's insecurity about acting the central role in such an important production by a major filmmaker. He seemed dumbfounded that Ernst Lubitsch had not only cast him but was building the film around him. Finally Lubitsch set him straight: "You think you are a comedian. You are not even a clown. You are fooling the public for 30 years. You are fooling even yourself. A clown - he is a performer what is doing funny things. A comedian - he is a performer what is saying funny things. But you, Jack, you are an actor, you are an actor playing the part of a comedian and this you are doing very well. But do not worry, I keep your secret to myself."
March 6, 1970 -
The Beatles released Let it Be in the UK on this date. Paul McCartney wrote this song supposedly after he had a dream about his mother who died when he was 14.
Since Let It Be was The Beatles last album, it made an appropriate statement about leaving problems behind and moving on in life. John Lennon hated the song because of it's apparent Christian overtones. He made the comment before recording it, "And now we'd like to do Hark The Angels Come."
The Beatles were so busy arguing with each other that Aretha Franklin was able to release a cover version of the song
on her album This Girl's In Love With You (as well as Eleanor Rigby), before The Beatles version came out.
March 6, 1970 -
David Bowie released the single The Prettiest Star in the UK on this date, as a follow-up single to Space Oddity. The track featured Marc Bolan on guitar, with whom Bowie would spend the next few years as a rival for the crown of the king of glam rock.
Bowie wrote this for his future wife, Angela 'Angie' Barnett. Bowie reportedly played it to Barnett over the phone when he proposed to her. Writing in The Mail On Sunday February 9, 2013, Angie recalled: "David wrote many of the songs for Aladdin Sane on his 1972 tour of America but 'The Prettiest Star' dates back to Christmas 1969. I was staying with my parents in Cyprus when he phoned and sang it down the phone to me. Two days later, I was back in London and our first stop was the recording studio, where Marc Bolan was adding the guitar solo. I was crazy about Aladdin Sane, loved the songs, especially 'The Prettiest Star.' That was the most personal. He wrote it for me."
March 6, 1973 -
Closing Time, one of Tom Waits’ most melodic albums, (and a fascinating snapshot into his early days as a bar-room balladeer,) was released on this date.
A number of artists covered songs from the album, starting a trend that would continue throughout Waits’ career. Martha was recorded by Tim Buckley and frequently performed by Bette Midler, while the Eagles recorded a version of Ol’ ‘55 for the band’s 1974 album On The Border.
March 5, 1995 -
Annie Lennox second solo album, Medusa, a collection of covers, was released on this date.
The first single No More I Love You's, was originally recorded by the English group The Lover Speaks.
March 6, 1998 -
The Coen Bros. off-kilter take on a Raymond Chandler detective story, The Big Lebowski, opened on this date.
John Turturro originally thought he was going to have a bigger role in the film. When he read the script, he realized the part was quite small. However, the Coen brothers let him come up with a lot of his own ideas for the character, like shining the bowling ball and the scene where he dances backwards, which he says was inspired by Muhammad Ali.
March 6, 2009 -
Zack Snyder's version of the seemingly unfilmable graphic novel, Watchmen, starring Malin Akerman, Billy Crudup, Matthew Goode, Carla Gugino, Jackie Earle Haley, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, and Patrick Wilson, premiered on this date.
Zack Snyder found casting for The Comedian to be a difficult process, as the character is gruff and grizzled. Most of the actors he met with he felt were too groomed. Jeffrey Dean Morgan was very grumpy during his meeting with Snyder, something that appealed to him a great deal.
Another book from the back shelves of the ACME Library
Today in History:
Michelangelo Buonaroti was born on this date in 1475. He painted and sculpted so much that it began to become embarrassing for other people, so they finally decided it was time to stop procrastinating and start the Renaissance.
So they did.
On March 6, 1619, Cyrano de Bergerac was born. Mr. de Bergerac was a brilliant French satirist and playwright, a rapier wit, and, from all contemporary accounts, an accomplished musician, an enthralling conversationalist, and a charming ladies' man.
He was unfortunately best known for his nose.
Dr. John Greenwood, George Washington's personal dentist, constructed the first 'dental foot engine' on this date in 1790.
March 6, 1836 -
... Davy, Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier.
(The Mexican army managed to lose over 600 men.)
Remember the Alamo.
March 6, 1857 -
After years in litigation, the Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice Roger Taney, ruled that Dred Scott did not gain his freedom by living in a free territory. Taney wrote that African Americans could not have rights of their own and inferior to white people.
The essence of the decision was that as a slave, Dred Scott was not a citizen and therefore could not sue in a federal court. The opinion also stated that Congress could not exclude slavery in the territories and that blacks could not become citizens. In 2017 Charles Taney IV apologized to the family of Dred Scott for the words of his great-great-grand-uncle.
March 6, 1869 -
Mendeleev's predictions were right, and he is credited with writing the first periodic table.
March 6, 1899 -
Friedrich Bayer and Co. patented their eponymous painkiller, Bayer aspirin in Berlin on this day. The compound salicylic acid, which occurs naturally in willow bark was already known to provide pain relief. Unfortunately it is bitter tasting and can cause vomiting. By mixing acetylating salicylic acid with acetic acid, German Bayer AG chemist Felix Hoffman concocted a less acidic formula to ease his father’s arthritis two years previously.
It quickly gained popularity, and at one time was the most used painkiller in the world.
March 6, 1912 -
National Biscuit Company's (Nabisco) Oreo cookies went on sale for the first time on this date.
The brand's competitor, Sunshine's Hydrox, had debuted in 1908. (Hydrox has up until recently, completely disappeared as a brand but secretly exists as 'cookie crumbs' for yogurt flavorings and an ingredient in piecrust.)
March 6, 1918 -
In January 1918, US naval collier (a ship that transports,) Cyclops was assigned to the Naval Overseas Transportation Service and sailed to Brazilian waters to fuel British ships in the South Atlantic.
It put to sea from Rio de Janeiro on February 16, 1918, and after touching at Barbados on March 3 and 4, was never heard from again. The loss of the ship without a trace is one of the sea's unsolved mysteries.
March 6, 1950 -
The original discovery was made in 1943 by James Wright who combined silicone oil and boric acid in the laboratories of General Electric. He was researching methods of making synthetic rubber, but at the time no significant application existed for the material. However, it was passed around as a curiosity.
Hodgson saw a sample and realized its potential simply for entertainment and coined its name for marketing it as a toy. Its popularity made him a millionaire. (Hey, that's Peter Hodgson as the salty sea dog pulling the putty.)
March 6, 1965 -
I'm not a stooge, I'm a straight lady - the best in Hollywood. There is an art to playing the straight role. You must build up your man but never top him, never steal the laughs.
Groucho Marx continued to alternately call Margaret Dumont "a great lady" and to denigrate her in interviews. But he seemed, at the end, to realize how important she'd been to his career. When accepting his 1974 Lifetime Achievement Oscar, the ailing Groucho told the audience, "I only wish Harpo and Chico could have been here - and Margaret Dumont."
March 6, 1970 -
In Greenwich Village, a townhouse at 18 West 11th St. exploded on this date. SDS Weathermen members Diana Oughton, Ted Gold and Terry Robbins were killed at the site where a bomb was being manufactured.
March 6, 1981 -
After 19 years presenting the CBS Evening News, Uncle Walter Cronkite, the most trusted man in America, signs off for the last time.
With all that we've been through, once again we must ask, who will carry that weight now?
And so it goes.
I keep your secret. Indeed
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