It's National Lollipop Day

Don’t go too overboard on the sugary treats, and remember to brush your teeth!



Shhh, I believe this holiday is a huge conspiracy perpetrated by a large Big Sugar Syndication.  That's the real reason behind the separatist attack on the Malaysian jetliner.


July 20, 1984 -
20th Century Fox releases the comedy film Revenge of the Nerds, starring Robert Carradine and Anthony Edwards on this date.



The University of Arizona agreed to let the filmmakers shoot at the campus, then revoked permission after reading the script. Eventually they changed their minds and let them shoot. Many students were used as extras.


Today in History:
July 20, 1402 -
At the battle of Angora, Tamerlane led his huge army of Taters against the Ottomans (or Ottomen). Tamerlane captured the Sultan (Head Ottoman), and this is why we call some sweaters Angoras to this day.

(Angora, however, is now called Ankara.)


July 20, 1801 -
According to legend, a 1,235 pound cheese ball was pressed at the farm of  Elisha Brown Jr. and taken to Washington D.C. by a horse-driven wagon.

He presented it as a gift to President Thomas Jefferson at the White House on this date.  (Or it could have been given to him on January 1st, 1801, I don't know, I wasn't there.)


July 20, 1903 -
The Ford Motor Company took its first order for a two-cylinder Model A car on July 15th 1903 and shipped the car on this date.

In early July of 1903, Ford’s cash balance was just $223.65 and it was doubtful if payroll could be fulfilled long enough to complete the existing works-in-progress. Chicago dentist named Ernst Pfenning bought the car for $850. His purchase and two other orders that week, kept the Ford Motor Company in business.


July 20, 1944 -
In an attempt on Hitler's life, a time bomb explodes in the situation room of the Wolf's Lair, killing four Nazi officers but only wounding the Fuhrer. After his close call, Hitler becomes even more paranoid. A massive purge is to follow, resulting in the execution of thousands of officers.



Hollywood's favorite 'frequently married little person (not Mickey Rooney)' starred in a film version of the event.


July 20, 1951 -
In Jerusalem at the al-Aqsa Mosque, King Abdullah of Jordan was shot three times in the head and chest by Mustapha Shukri Usho, a Palestinian opposed to peace with Israel.

Abdullah died on the spot.


July 20, 1969 -
As a world-wide audience held their collective breathe, Neil Armstrong steps foot on the Moon. It was a brave thing to do (and unfortunately caused Buzz to have his post-Apollo 11 period of alcoholism and depression.)



It was also the first mission to bring back samples from a foreign planetary body — the samples dated back 3.7 billion years.



And whatever you do, don't ask Buzz if it was faked.


July 20, 1973 -
In Hong Kong, martial artist Bruce Lee fell into a coma and died of cerebral edema on this date. He had been experiencing brain problems beginning in May, which included sporadic loss of consciousness (I've always hated when that happens.)



Lee's death happened shortly before the release of Enter the Dragon, his most successful film.


July 20, 1976 -
The US spacecraft Viking 1 was the first craft ever to land on Mars on this date. It holds the record for having the second longest mission on Mars' surface: 6 years and 116 days.



NASA terminated communications with the craft on August 17, 1980.  So technically, it's still there (unless the martians have stripped the craft and have it up on blocks.)


July 20, 1994 -
O.J. Simpson offered a $500,000 reward for information leading to the capture of the Real Killers on this date.

To this day progress remains elusive, although Simpson continues his search throughout the prison shower stalls of Lovelock, Nevada.



And so it goes.

The hits keep coming

Weird Al keeps releasing new videos to promote his latest album, Mandatory Fun.  This one is an original tune, rather that a parody - Sports Song.



It should become mandatory at all sporting events.


Every year on this day, since about 1104, any married couple who could prove they had been faithful and loving to one another for one year was awarded half a pig, known as a flitch of bacon.



(The video above shows the last know couple would actually "brought home the bacon!")


It's both National Ice Cream Day and National Daiquiri Day.





It's been very humid the past few days, so either one of these are appropriate to celebrate (although, I have to believe Hemingway never knowingly had a slice of Cookie Puss cake.)


July 19, 1980 -
Billy Joel's hit, It's Still Rock and Roll to Me, topped the charts on this date.



This was one of Joel's most popular songs, this was his first #1 hit on the Hot 100, spending two weeks at the top spot. The single went on to be certified Platinum, with sales in excess of 2 million copies.


Today in history:
July 19, 1692 -
Five Salem witches were hanged for the crime of witchcraft on this date, based primarily on the accusations of little girls who were bewitched.

Eventually, the village executes a total of 20 witches.


July 19, 1870 -
France attempted to declare war on Russia. Due to a typographical error, however, France inadvertently declared war on Prussia on this date and caused the Franco-Prussian War. This eventually led to the creation of Germany, which led to World War I, World War II, and the Volkswagen.



Moral: always proofread.


July 19, 1919 -
Raymonde de Larouche, the first woman to pilot a plane in 1909 and first woman to receive a pilot's license, died in an plane crash at Le Crotoy airport in France, on this date.

Raymonde de Laroche had miraculously survived three serious crashes before the fourth one claimed her.


July 19, 1937 -
The Nazis opened Entartete Kunst, the Degenerate Art show, in Munich on this date. The traveling exhibition offers up Expressionism for ridicule, carefully arranged by (offensive) subject.



The German youth were not admitted, lest they become tainted.


July 19, 1952 -
Keep watching the skies.



During a series of UFO sightings in Washington, D.C. occurring over July 13-29, unidentified objects are picked up on D.C.'s National Airport radar system. Sightings in the region are so extensive the Air Force is prompted to hold a press conference. Conveniently, these are all "radar mirages" resulting from "temperature inversions."


July 19, 1966 -
Frank Sinatra married Mia Farrow in Las Vegas on this date.

Ava Gardner's famous comment on the union: Hah! I always knew Frank would end up in bed with a little boy!

Ouch.


July 19, 1969 -
John Fairfax, after an amazing 180 days alone at sea, became the first person to row solo across the Atlantic Ocean. (When Fairfax was asked what he did for a living, he would usually answer, "I'm a professional adventurer. I not only enjoy it, I try to make money off it.")

Two year later he rowed across the Pacific with his then-girlfriend Sylvia Cook; the trip took them 361 days. They became the first people to accomplish that feat.


July 19, 1984 -
I stand before you to proclaim tonight, America is a land where dreams can come true for all of us.



30 years ago today,  U.S. Rep. Geraldine A. Ferraro of New York won the Democratic nomination for vice president at the party's convention in San Francisco. (Co-incidentally,  the first women's rights convention was held in Seneca Falls, NY on this date in 1848.)



And so it goes.

In the middle of July, no less!

Today, July 18th, is National Caviar Day.

While it's normal to wash down fish roe with champagne or iced vodka, but why not down shots of iced Bombay Sapphire. (I'm not a paid spokesperson but I am more than willing to be one.)


July 18, 1929 -
It's Screamin' Jay Hawkins Birthday.



Remember, get naked and dance around the house, just do it.


Today in History:
July 18, 64 -
Most of imperial Rome was burned to the ground because Emperor Nero had been playing the fiddle. This resulted in the persecution of Christians, many of whom were believed to have encouraged him.





You know how those early Christians love their city burning, fiddle playing, crazed Emperors.



Yes, I'm aware that Nero wasn't even in Rome at the time of the fire. At this time, I do not believe even the stringent libel laws in England cover this.


July 18, 1870 -
At the end of Vatican I, Catholic popes are proclaimed infallible by chapter four of the papal bull Pastor Aeternus. The pope's declarations on matters of faith are protected from error by the Holy Spirit. In a nutshell: whatever he says about the scripture, goes.



This is an interesting doctrine, considering how often St. Peter is himself contradicted by the Gospels.


July 18, 1913 -
Richard "Red" Skelton, was born in Vincennes, Ind., on this date. During a career that stretched through medicine shows, vaudeville, motion pictures, radio and television, the gentle Skelton created a host of characters from the silent tramp Freddie the Freeloader to the Mean Widdle Kid, who coined the catch phrase, "I dood it!"



In a People Magazine interview late in his life, Skelton admitted that he fudged his officially accepted birth year, but did not elaborate. The year 1910 is sometimes given instead of 1913, but Skelton's biographer Arthur Marx claims that the comedian told close associates he was really born in 1906.


July 18, 1925 -
Today marks the 89th anniversary of the publication of Adolf Hitler's best-selling political memoir, Mein Kampf (or, in English, "I'm Crazy and I'm Gonna Kill You"). The book remains extremely popular with genocidal sociopaths and is therefore experiencing a renaissance of sales.



The book's original title was Four-and-a-Half Years of Struggle against Lies, Stupidity, and Cowardice.

Taking him at his word and assuming the little lance-corporal really had struggled against lies, stupidity, and cowardice for 54 months, one has to ask, in light of his later activities, if maybe lies, stupidity, and cowardice aren't so bad.


July 18, 1936 -
The first Oscar Meyer Wienermobile rolled out of General Body Company’s factory in Chicago (when Carl Mayer approached his uncle Oscar with the idea of driving a giant hot dog through Chicago streets, IL.) on this date.



The Wienermobile started as a smallish 13-foot affair (Carl Mayer drove around with his head sticking through a hole in the roof)


July 18, 1939 -
Hunter S. Thompson's birthday is today.



He was once considered, armed, and dangerous. Now he is no more than soot on the window sills of his and his neighbors homes. Dr. Thompson founded the Gonzo school of journalism in the 1970s; graduates from that school can today be seen every night on cable news.

Dr. Thompson inspired the character "Uncle Duke" in the comic strip Doonesbury, by former Canadian Prime Minister Gary Trudeau.

(Uncle Duke first appeared in Doonesbury on July 8, 1974.) Several movies have been made about Dr. Thompson's life and work and psychotic episodes. He is perhaps the only American journalist to have been played on-screen by both Bill Murray



and Johnny Depp.




July 18, 1947 -
British seized the Exodus 1947 ship of Jewish immigrants to Palestine on this date. The British Royal Navy intercepted the ship President Warfield, which had been renamed Exodus by its passengers, forcing the 4,000 Jewish would-be immigrants aboard back to Displaced Person camps in Germany.



Britain was still the ruling power in Palestine, which was being wracked by conflict resulting from Jewish national aspirations. The return of the Jewish immigrants, many of them survivors of Nazi persecution, heightened anti-British sentiment among Jews in Palestine and elsewhere.


July 18, 1966 -
In Los Angeles, the beaten corpse of Bobby Fuller was found sprawled across the front seat of his mother's Oldsmobile. Fuller, whose band The Bobby Fuller Four released the hit I Fought The Law, was found to have died from "forced inhalation of gasoline."



Technically, Fuller died from huffing... although circumstances point to murder.


July 18, 1969 -
Driving home from a party on Chappaquiddick Island, Senator Ted Kennedy's car goes over the side of Dike Bridge and flips over into a pond. Kennedy manages to free himself from the automobile, but his passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, drowned. (Once again - don't hitch a ride with a Kennedy.)



For some reason, Kennedy told no one about the accident for at least an hour, and waited until the following morning to notify local police.


July 18, 1976 -
Romanian Nadia Comaneci became the first gymnast to receive a perfect-ten score in 1976 Olympic competition.



In 2000, Comaneci was named as one of the athletes of the century by the Laureus World Sports Academy.


July 18, 1988 -
I have a habit of leaving places at the wrong time, just when something big may have happened for me.



Rock and Roll performer/ heroin addict Nico wiped out on her bicycle on Ibiza and died from a brain hemorrhage on this day - that, combined with a lack of medical treatment.



And so it goes.

He can get out of any spot

July 17, 1943 -
Originally released in B & W (re-release as a color version in 1968 & 1990,) Porky Pig's Feat premiered on this date. This is the first time the Raymond Scott composition Powerhouse is used in a Warner Bros. cartoon.



A rare appearance for Porky Pig (his last appearance in a black and white cartoon,) Daffy Duck & Bugs Bunny (his only appearance in a theatrical black and white film.)


There's no damn business like show business - you have to smile to keep from throwing up. - Billie Holiday







Today is the 55th anniversary of the death of Billie Holiday.


July 17, 1956 -
The musical version of The Philadelphia Story, High Society, starring Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly & Frank Sinatra, premiered on this date.



The house used for the exterior of Dexter's mansion was later bought by "Sunny" von Bülow and her husband Klaus.


July 17, 1959 -
Alfred Hitchcock's superlative North By Northwest, starring Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint, premiered on this date.



One day, Martin Landau noticed that Alfred Hitchcock was giving instructions to Cary Grant, James Mason and Eva Marie Saint. When he asked Hitchcock about this, the director basically said if he didn't talk to actors, they were doing fine; when he talked to them, it was because they did something wrong.


July 17, 1968 -
The premiere of the drug-induced, Big Blue Meanie-infested cartoon Beatles film Yellow Submarine, was held at the London Pavilion on this date.



George comments "I know something about motors" when the submarine's stops working. As a matter of fact, George Harrison's brother was a mechanic, and George himself had worked as an apprentice electrician in his teens and planned to go into business with his brother.


July 17, 1992 -
Walt Disney Pictures releases the science fiction comedy Honey, I Blew Up the Kid, directed by Randal Kleiser, on this date.



Much of the the dialogue between Mr. Szalinski and little Adam, such as the bedtime story and feeding time, was improvised by Rick Moranis in response to whatever Daniel Shalikar and Joshua Shalikar, the twins who played Adam, happened to say.


July 17, 1999 -
The series, Spongebob Squarepants, created by marine biologist and animator Stephen Hillenburg, premiered on Nickelodeon on this date.



The cartoon gained popularity in its second season and continues that popularity today. It's the highest-rated show on the Nickelodeon television network.


Today in History:
July 17 1913 -
On this date, audiences attending the silent film A Noise from the Deep observed Mabel Normand striking Fatty Arbuckle in the face with a pie. It was purportedly the first use of the pie-in-the-face routine in film history.

It may not seem that remarkable when you consider how much history there'd been in film prior to 1913, but it was an important milestone nonetheless.

The act of hitting someone in the face with a pie was itself nothing new. Hieroglyphics engraved on the sarcophagus of the ancient Egyptian King Amenhotep III, for example, depict that merry lord hurling pies of polished stone at his subjects with such force that they were frequently decapitated.

Thucydides and Herodotus both make mention of a great pie battle at Salamis, with the latter observing that "it was a moment of much hilarity until someone hit Xerxes."

Plutarch describes the wanton Messalina "grinding her pie in the face of a slave."

The merriment of the ancient world gradually succumbed to the joyless monotony of the middle-ages, however and pie facials were neglected for centuries. The mirth did not resume until 1518, when Martin Luther nailed Pope Leo X with a cream-covered blueberry pie - the first documented case of torte reform.

Roughly a century later, Shakespeare introduced the routine to Elizabethan audiences with memorable pie-in-the-face scenes in King Lear, Hamlet and Othello. Scholars have recently unearthed a draft of what Shakespeare clearly intended to be his comedic masterwork, Two Bakers of Venice.

After Shakespeare's pioneering work in the field, the pie-in-the-face became a staple of popular entertainment. Seen in this context, the celebrated Arbuckle pie facial was just one more step on a very long journey.



Indeed, being struck in the face by baked goods is likely to remain the most hilarious thing in the world for centuries to come.


July 17, 1917 -
Britain's King George V issues a royal proclamation changing his family's surname from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to Windsor.

Thus, everyone is fooled into believing that a bunch of inbred Germans are really English. Which is convenient, because England just so happens to be at war with the other side of the family, Germany.

(Yes, they're cousins, identical cousins - King George V and Tsar, Czar, Csar Nicholas II)

Speaking of George's cousin, Russian Czar Nicholas II was murdered with his family and servants by the Bolsheviks at Yekaterinburg on this date in 1918 (they were murdered in the middle of the night on the 17th of July.) It's too bad his cousin, George V was more concerned with changing his Germanic surname then saving his cousin.



This included his daughter Anastasia, who may not actually have been killed with the rest of them but was almost certainly killed along with the rest of them despite persistent rumors to the contrary--even in the face of almost insurmountable evidence suggesting otherwise (except when interpreted differently). Even if she wasn't dead then, she's certainly dead now. This has been scientifically proven by scientists who ought to know.


July 17, 1918 -
The RMS Carpathia, famous for rescuing 705 survivors from the RMS Titanic six years earlier, sank off the coast of Ireland after being torpedoed by a German U-boat, on this date.



While 5 crew member were killed in the attack, 57 passengers and the remaining 218 crew members survived to board lifeboats off the sinking vessel.


July 17, 1936 -
General Francisco Franco, low level Spanish Evil Stooge, seizes control of the Canary Islands (in the misguided belief that Spain could become a world power by controlling the supply of small yellow birdies), signaling the start of the three-year Spanish Civil War.

And he's still dead.


July 17, 1938 -
On this date, Douglas Corrigan took off from Brooklyn's Floyd Bennett Field for a cross-country flight to the west coast in his nine-year-old, single-engine Curtiss Robin airplane.



Twenty-eight hours later he landed in Dublin, Ireland, thus earning himself the nickname "Wrong Way Corrigan" and becoming the patron saint of baggage handlers.


July 17, 1947 -
Jackie Robinson was playing his historic first season with the Dodgers, the Yankees finally lost after 19 straight victories and Perry Como topped the Billboard charts with “Chi-Baba, Chi-Baba (My Bambino Go to Sleep)” and Jack Kerouac began his “On the Road” trip, on this date. He left his mother’s apartment in Ozone Park and wound up on the West Side IRT local, passing Columbia, where he had dropped out, and got off the train at the 242 Street terminal. At 242 Street, (near Van Cortlandt Park) he boarded a trolley for Yonkers, transferred to another for as far as it would go, then hitchhiked farther up the Hudson. He wanted to take the “long red line called Route 6” that he had seen on a map, and the nearest place for him to join it was the Bear Mtn Bridge.



When he got there, he discovered that little traffic passed through that semi-wilderness, and while waiting futilely for a ride, he got drenched in a thunderstorm. Humiliated by his “stupid hearthside idea that it would be wonderful to follow one great red line across America,” he ended up taking a bus back to NYC and another all the way to Chicago. He took a third bus to the Chicago suburbs and began hitchhiking to Denver, to see friends he had made in NYC, including Neal Cassady.



Such is the stuff of great literature - a subway ride that many of you loyal readers have made countless times, is transformed into the the opening trip of the classic novel of the Beat Generation, On the Road.


July 17, 1952 -
It's David Hasselhoff's (noted 'actor', 'singer', talent judge, hamburger connoisseur and drunk) birthday!



Yeah for David! Yeah for Germany!

(David shares his birthday with Angela Merkel born two years later in 1954 - co-incidence, you be the judge.)


July 17, 1955 -
That place is my baby, and I would prostitute myself for it. - Walt Disney

Disneyland, the happiest place in the world, opens in Anaheim, California on this date.  Things didn't go so well on that first day.



A 15 day heat wave raised temperatures up to 110 degrees Fahrenheit. Also, due to a plumbers strike, few water fountains were operating in the hot weather. Asphalt still steaming, because it had been laid the night before, literally "trapping" high heeled shoes. To add to the chaos, a gas leak forced the closing of several sections of the park.



If things didn't turn around, I shudder at the thought of Ole Walt and his pal J. Edgar, having to walk the street in matching lipstick, handbag and stiletto, offering to 'go around the world' for 20 bucks to pay back his loans.


July 17, 1975 -
Apollo 18 and Soyuz 19 successfully docked and crew member of the two shuttles shook hands in space on this date.



It was the first orbital docking of spacecraft of two different nations


July 17, 1996 -
TWA flight 800, bound for Paris, exploded 12 minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy airport, killing all 230 people on board, on this date.



Though there was speculation, no evidence of a terrorist attack was ever found.



And so it goes.

Help me, help me ....

July 16, 1948 -
John Huston's version of Maxwell Anderson's play, Key Largo, starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall premiered in New York on this date.



Lionel Barrymore was severely disabled by arthritis (clearly visible in his hands) and was confined to a wheelchair, making the scene in which his Mr. Temple character gets up and falls taking a swing at Toots more than a dramatic moment.


July 16, 1951 -
One of the best adaptations of a Charles Dickens' novel, David Lean's Oliver Twist was released in the US on this date.



The film was released in England in 1948 but the film's release in the US was delayed until 1951 because of protests from Jewish pressure groups, who judged Alec Guinness' portrayal of Fagin to be anti-Semitic.


July 16, 1958 -
The classic Vincent Price Sci-Fi film, The Fly, opened in San Francisco on this date.




In the scene where the fly with Andre Delambre's head and arm is caught in the spider's web, a small animatronic figure with a moving head and arm was used in the spiderweb as a reference for actors Vincent Price and Herbert Marshall. Price later remembered that filming the scene required multiple takes, because each time he and Marshall looked at the animatronic figure, with its human head and insect body, they would burst out laughing.


July 16, 1983 -
The Police song about an obsessive stalker, (completely misunderstood by most of their fans,) Every Breath You Take topped the charts on this date.



The Police performed this when they were inducted in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in 2003. They were inducted by No Doubt lead singer Gwen Stefani,

who showed a picture of her getting an autograph from Sting when she was 13-year-old.


July 16, 1999 -
Stanley Kubrick final film, Eyes Wide Shut, was released on this date.



Director Stanley Kubrick reportedly watched movies like Showgirls, Basic Instinct and Fatal Attraction during the editing phase, to get the idea of how explicit the sex scenes in the movie could be and still retain the R-rated movie he had contractually agreed to deliver.


Today in History:
July 16, 1054 -
The 'Great Schism' between the Western and Eastern churches began over rival claims of universal pre-eminence. (In 1965, 911 years later, Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras I met to declare an end to the schism.)

Remember kids, there's no schism like a great schism.


Mary Baker Eddy was born on this date in 1821.



Ms. Eddy invented Christian Science, and was elected to the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1995 for having been the only American woman to found a worldwide religion without exposing her breasts.


July 16, 1860 -
A decree from Emperor Norton I of San Francisco, Emperor of the United States and Protector of Mexico, ordered the dissolution of the United States of America on this date.

(More on the good Emperor next month.)


July 16, 1945 -
...If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One - I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds....



Code-named Trinity, the first experimental plutonium bomb (The Gadget) was detonated in a United States test of an atomic explosion at Alamogordo Air Base, Los Alamos, New Mexico on this date. The explosion yields the equivalent 18,000 tons of TNT.


July 16, 1948 -
In the first skyjacking of a commercial plane, three armed men stormed the cockpit of the Miss Macao on this date, a passenger seaplane operated by Cathay Pacific airline.

When the pilot refuses to turn over the controls, he was shot dead and the plane crashes into the ocean. The only survivor among the 27 people on board was the leader of the terrorists.

Oops.


July 16, 1951 -
The Catcher in the Rye was published 63 years ago today. The book contained secret code words by means of which its author, J.D. Salinger, was able to communicate diabolical commands to his evil minions. (Exactly fourteen years later, the tunnel connecting France and Italy through Mont Blanc was opened to the public.



Draw your own conclusions.)

Salinger was a one-hit wonder. (He did write several other books, but these are of interest only to insomniacs and those with wobbly furniture.) The Catcher in the Rye was published in 1951, and Salinger subsequently hid himself away in the hills of Vermont, emerging from this self-imposed cloister only once, briefly, to serve as Prime Minister of Canada and to appear as a corpse at his own funeral. For nearly half a century, The Catcher in the Rye has captured the imagination of the American teenager like no other book without pictures.



Holden Caulfield, the hero and narrator of Salinger's slim classic, may be the finest portrait of twentieth-century American teenage angst bequeathed to posterity.



Either him or Archie, it's hard to say.

(although Archie did just give up his life to save a friend.)


July 16, 1964 -
In accepting the Republican presidential nomination in San Francisco, Barry M. Goldwater said "extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice" and that "moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue."



Goldwater's speech ultimately doomed his candidacy but revived the American Conservative movement and gave birth to the political rise of Ronald Reagan.


July 16, 1969 -
45 years ago on this date, the 363-foot-tall Apollo 11 space vehicle was launched from Pad A, Launch Complex 39, Kennedy Space Center, at 9:37 a.m. (I only put it together now that some sick puppies at NASA arranged to have the launch on the anniversary of the Trinity test.)



It carried Mission Commander Neil Alden Armstrong, Command Module Pilot Michael Collins and Lunar Module Pilot Edwin Eugene 'Buzz' Aldrin, Jr.


July 16, 1973 -
In testimony before the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities (the Ervin Committee on Watergate), former presidential assistant Alexander Butterfield disclosed that President Richard Nixon had tape recorded all of his conversations in the White House and Executive Office Building.



Bad, Nixon, bad.


July 16, 1999 -
15 years ago today, John F.Kennedy Jr. was killed along with his wife Carolyn and sister-in-law Lauren Bessette when the aircraft he was piloting crashed into the Atlantic Ocean. (Don't hitch a ride with a Kennedy.)



He was flying a Piper Saratoga II HP from Essex County Airport in New Jersey to Martha's Vineyard. Kennedy and his wife were traveling together to the wedding of his cousin Rory in Hyannis, Massachusetts, while Lauren was to have been dropped off at Martha's Vineyard en route.



And so it goes.

I didn't know this

The man in jail in Monopoly;

his name is Jake the Jailbird


July 15, 1946 -
The thing you have to be prepared for is that other people don't always dream your dream.







Linda Ronstadt, singer and actress was born in Tucson, Arizona on this date.


July 15 1956 -
Every man its prisoner... every woman its slave!

Although not in the same league as Plan 9 from Outer Space, It Conquered the World was released upon an unsuspecting public on this date.



Although usually referred to as a being a "cucumber" or another vegetable by fans, "Beluah" is actually supposed to be a fungus.  Originally, "Beluah" was built as a squat, flat-topped creature, but when it turned out not to be imposing enough - and to actually be shorter than leading lady Beverly Garland - a tapering conical top was added to it.


July 15, 1998 -
The Farrelly Brothers career saving romantic comedy, There's Something About Mary premiered on this date.



Dropping Ted on the stretcher wasn't scripted. When it happened, they cut to make sure Ben Stiller was okay and then thought it was so funny they left it in.


Today in History:
July 15, 1606 -
Rembrandt van Rijn was born in Leiden, Holland, on this date.

His father was a miller and his mother was a stay-at-home mom.



He is best known for his mastery of chiaroscuro and impasto, but his calamari was nothing to sneeze at.


July 15, 1799 -
The Rosetta Stone is an Ancient Egyptian artifact which was instrumental in advancing modern understanding of hieroglyphic writing. The stone is a Ptolemaic era stele with carved text. The text is made up of three translations of a single passage, written in two Egyptian language scripts (hieroglyphic and Demotic), and in classical Greek.



It was created in 196 BC, discovered by the Napoleonic expeditionary forces in 1799 at Rashid (a harbour on the Mediterranean coast in Egypt which the French referred to Rosetta) and contributed greatly to the decipherment of the principles of hieroglyphic writing in 1822 by the British polymath Thomas Young and the French scholar Jean-François Champollion.

Feel free to impress your friends with this bit of knowledge.


July 15, 1857 -
During an uprising, the group of British women and children being held by rebels in Chawnpore, India were cut to pieces with knives and hatchets. Then their remains are tossed into a well.



When British forces finally retake Chawnpore, the captured rebels are taken back to the house where the slaughter took place. Then they are forced to lick the floors clean, after which they are hanged.

I hate to think what the penalty was for early withdrawal from your IRA.


July 15 1864 -
A train containing hundreds of Confederate prisoners passing through Shohola, PA crashes head on with a coal train on this date.

The trains were off schedule because of an escape attempt. 74 people, mostly prisoners, died.


July 15, 1869 -
During war with Prussia, French ruler Napoleon III commissions Hippolye Mege Mouries to find a butter substitute. A patent for margarine was issued on this date, it being based on beef fat instead of milk fat.

He called it Margarine (but you can call it Oleo) because the French word for pearl was margarite and he apparently had difficulty distinguishing butter from pearls -



a handicap that goes a long way toward explaining his many divorces.



But even with the tactically superior spread, the war is still lost.


July 15, 1904 -
A small town Russian alcoholic doctor quietly succumbed to consumption, while in another room, his relatives sat around the house and wistfully bemoaned the lost opportunities of their lives. An old family retainer served tea to the unknowing mourners. Off in the distance, the guitar string of a peasant guitar breaks, all on this date.



Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, died on this date but not as described above. As he lay dying of tuberculosis, in a German Spa, Chekhov called out for his doctor. The doctor examined him and prescribed him a glass of champagne. Chekhov finished his glass, commented on the taste, lay back down and died.  All in all, not a bad way to go.



And so it goes

You know whether or not you should celebrate

It's National Nude day. I would say for the most part, there are very few people who should actually celebrate the holiday in public.

Please feel free to celebrate responsibly within the confines of your own home.


July 14, 1918 -
Arguably one the the greatest film directors ever, Ingmar Bergman, was born on this date.







In an interview in 2004, Bergman said that he was "depressed" by his own films and could not watch them anymore.


July 14, 1933 -
The iconic Popeye the Sailor, appeared in his first eponymously titled cartoon, on this date.  (Kids, Betty's not wearing a bra - so avert your eyes.)



Popeye's appearance is based on that of a fighter named Francis "Rocky" Fiegel whom his creator, Elzie Segar, used to know. Because of this, a tombstone was put on his hitherto unmarked grave in 1996. Segar paid Fiegel a small fee for the use of his likeness, as he was still alive when Popeye first appeared.


Today in History:
July 14 1789 -
Paris was not a happy city in 1789. Paris has never been an especially happy city, especially for those who don't speak French, but in that fateful year, it was especially grouchy. And it wasn't just the city, but the whole country. All of France was being cranky and irritable, and all the other countries were like, "What?"



Finally the queen said they should eat cake and the nation snapped. The people rose up in protest and, it being time for the French Revolution, they stormed the Bastille (Bastille) on July 14, 1789.



A mob of 20,000 people storms Bastille Prison in Paris, killing its personnel and freeing all seven prisoners incarcerated therein: four forgers, an accomplice to murder, the Marquis de Sade (yes that guy), and an insane Irishman. The warden was decapitated and his head carried around on a pike. So begins the French Revolution.



It quickly became clear that the peasants were revolting. (Not that anyone ever thought they were all that attractive.) The storming of the Bastille gave way to a Rain of Terror, a meteorological cataclysm in its own right, which eventually caused Napoleon and led to both Waterloo and Able Was I Ere I Saw Elba, all of which have been covered in previous postings and can therefore be ignored for the time being. Eventually the French (who had always been winers) immersed themselves in Bourbon.


On July 14, 1867, Alfred Nobel first demonstrated his newest invention: dynamite. Mr Nobel spent the rest of his life blowing things up in the interests of world peace.



Sadly, world peace was not achieved in his lifetime. Upon his death he therefore endowed a foundation with billions of dollars to give prizes to men and women of future generations who brought the world closer to peace by blowing things up.

At the rate things have been blowing up lately, world peace is obviously just around the corner.


July 14, 1881 -
In the Summer of '81, at the New Mexico home of his friend Pete Maxwell, notorious outlaw Billy the Kid (Paul Newman/ Kris Kristofferson) stepped into a darkened bedroom and was shot dead by sheriff Pat Garrett (Thomas Mitchell/ James Coburn). Billy's last words were "Quién es?" (Who is it?).



How Jane Russell's breasts are involved in this story is another matter completely.


July 14, 1902 -
One day after workmen noticed a large crack in the structure, the Belltower of St. Mark's collapsed into a hill of white dust, on this date.



Ten years later, the city of Venice erected an exact duplicate of the tower on the same spot.



And so it goes.

The birthday weekend is still going strong

We all went out to dinner last night and my guests were able to retain their dignity.

I can't speak about my own.

July 13, 1959 -
Dedicated to the One I Love, by The Shirelles, was released on this date.



This was originally recorded by The 5 Royales in 1958. The Shirelles' version first peaked at #83 in 1959, but when it was re-released in 1961 it went to #3.  Normally, Shirley Owens Alston was the Shirelles' lead singer. However, on this song, Doris Coley Kenner sang lead.


July 13, 1960 -
20th Century Fox released the sci-fi adventure film The Lost World (based on the novel by Arthur Conan Doyle), directed by Irwin Allen and starring Michael Rennie, Jill St. John, Claude Rains and Fernando Lamas, to U.S. theaters on this date.



Director Irwin Allen wanted to use stop-motion dinosaurs for this film, but due to budget reasons he had to use lizards - mainly monitor lizards - as dinosaurs. Plastic horns and spikes were attached to them to make them look more like dinosaurs.  The technique will later be dubbed Slurpasaur by fans.


July 13, 1972 -
The Japanese sci-fi film The X from Outer Space (Uchū Daikaijū Girara or Giant Space Monster Guilala,) directed by Eiji Okada, released in 1967 in Japan (and 1968 in the US) for some reason was finally released to in Europe on this date. This is all very confusing.



This was the movie studio Shochiku's first monster movie.


July 13, 1985 -
29 years ago, I had only recently patented the long birthday weekend....





(still the greatest recorded live rock & roll performance of all time.)



We brought the 'big TV' out into my father-in-law's backyard and joined the other 1.5 billion people who tuned into Live Aid on this date.


Today in History
July 13, 1793 (Décade III, Quintidi de Messidor de l'Année 213 de la Révolution) -



French revolutionary writer Jean Paul Marat was stabbed to death in his bathtub by Charlotte Corday, on this date, as she gives him a list of names to be guillotined. The assassination inspired the famous painting by Jacques Louis David; Corday was executed four days after slaying Marat.



After the heavy blade fell, an executioner's assistant named Francois le Gros (Fat Frank) picked up the severed head by the hair and brimming with Revolutionary fervor slapped Corday's cheek. Several eyewitnesses saw her face flush red with anger, not just one cheek but both cheeks. Some though they perceived disgust curl her lips.


July 13, 1846 -
Horace Greeley advises his readers to 'Go west young man'  on this date.



I'm not sure but I don't think this is what Mr. Greeley had in mind.


July 13, 1946 -
It's Richard Anthony Marin's birthday today.



Smoke 'em if you got 'em.


July 13, 1955 -
Ruth Ellis was last English woman executed by hanging on this date.



Ten days before she had shot her lover, race car driver David Blakely, Ellis suffered a miscarriage after Blakely, the baby's father, punched her in the stomach.

She was having a bad day.


July 13, 1977 -
Starting at about 9 pm on this date, four lightning strikes on high-voltage transmission lines within the course of about half-an-hour knocked out electricity and plunged millions of residents of New York City into a 25 hour black-out .



The 1977 blackout, unlike the 1965 and 2003 blackouts, resulted in city-wide looting and other disorder, including arson. About 4,500 people were arrested during the riots, which resulted in damage estimated at $61 million.


July 13, 1985 -
President Ronald Reagan has a polyp removed from his colon on this date.

The polyp, named Larry, is still living comfortable at the Reagan ranch keeping Nancy company. George H.W. Bush got his first taste of the Presidency for a day and got hooked.


July 13, 1994 -
Jeff Gillooly (and his fabulous 70s porn 'stache,) Tonya Harding's ex-husband, was sentenced to two years in prison for his role in the attack on Nancy Kerrigan.

He served six months.


On July 13, 1994, Germany's Constitutional Court ended the ban on German troops fighting outside the country.

(On July 14, 1994, France's Constitutional Court ended their ban on running like hell.)

And so it goes.

Shhh, it's a plot of the Illuminati

It's Manhattanhenge time again. It was great foresight on the part of our beloved city forefathers to lay out the city in such a way that this happens every year just around my birthday.

Once again, the sun will be perfectly lined up with the east-west streets of New York.

So get outside and enjoy it.


July 12, 100 BCE -
Julius Caesar was born on this date. He is famous for fighting the Garlic Wars and dying of the unkindest cut. His death so shocked the people of Rome that they buried him instead of praising him, although this may have been because he was a Proud Man.



Interesting to note that in between, fighting across most of Europe, Julie baby was quoted as saying, It is easier to find men who will volunteer to die, than to find those who are willing to endure pain with patience.


July 12, 1908 -
Milton Berle was an Emmy-winning American comedian who was born Milton Berlinger, on this date. As the manic host of NBC's Texaco Star Theater (1948-1955), he was the first major star of television. He became known as Uncle Miltie to millions during TV's golden age.



That's all well and good but the real thing you want to know about Uncle Miltie is his prodigious member.



Now try getting that out of your mind's eye.


Other July 12 birthdays include:
Henry David Thoreau (1817)




George Washington Carver (1861 - there is no actual documentation on his exact birth date)



(God bless you Dr. Carver, for your work on alcohol.)


Oscar Hammerstein II (1895)




R. Buckminster Fuller (1895)




"Curly" Joe DeRita (1909)




Bill Cosby (1937)




Richard Simmons (1948)




Me (1960)

Kristi Yamaguchi (1971)




July 12, 1912 -
The first foreign-made film to premiere in America, Queen Elizabeth (Les Amours de la Reine Élisabeth), starring Sarah Bernhardt premiered on this date in NYC.



Rumors that Bernhardt performed in the film uniped are untrue.  Bernhardt did lose her leg to gangrene in 1915.


On July 12, 1957, Dwight D. Eisenhower became the first president to employ a helicopter while in office. The first helicopter put into presidential service was the HMX-1 "Nighthawks."

Though helicopters had been in operational use by the American military since 1944, concerns over their safety caused the Secret Service to bar their use for the nation’s chief executive except in case of emergency.


July 12, 1962 -
The Rolling Stones, (or more precisely, the group that they became) gave their first concert on this date. The concert was held in London at the Marquee Club. Yes, that makes the Stones more than 50 years old.



At the time, the band was called The Rollin' Stones — they got their current name in 1963. One of the most successful groups in history, the band has sold more than 200 million albums and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989.


July 12, 1984 -
Madonna's Like a Virgin video premiered on MTV on this date and became an instant hit.



Nile Rodgers produced this and recorded it using real musicians instead of relying on synthesized tracks that were characteristic of Madonna's first album.


Today in History:
July 12, 1843-
Mormon numero uno Joseph Smith discloses a divine revelation instructing his followers to take multiple wives, in what the LDS Church calls "plural marriage" but everyone else calls polygamy.



The Mormons are ultimately forced to disclaim the practice in September 1890.


July 12, 1960 -
In 1955, a French electrician named André Cassagnes got an idea for a new toy after seeing how an electrostatic charge could hold aluminum powder to glass. He worked up a prototype for the toy—based on the design of a television screen—in his basement workshop and called it L’Ecran Magique, or the magic screen.



The first Etch-A-Sketch went on sale on this date.


July 12, 1979 -
Bonanno boss Carmine Galante, the "cigar problem", was whacked at Joe and Mary's Restaurant in Brooklyn on this date. Galante died with a cigar still in his mouth.

Almost everyone in the New York mob feared the ruthless crime boss, so the killing was sanctioned by the consensus of Paul Castellano, Joe Bonanno and Santo Trafficante.


July 12, 1979 -
It was "Disco Demolition Night" at Chicago's Comiskey Park, where baseball tickets cost only $.98 if the purchaser brought along a disco record for the bonfire on this date.



During the second game of the doubleheader, thousands of vinyl LPs flew onto the field, generating enough chaos that the White Sox are forced to forfeit.


On a personal note: It's another anniversary of my 39th birthday. I've now reached an age that I am well past the half way point and close to seeing the final quarter but ultimately, it's all good.



And so it goes.

It's actually called Sphenopalatine Ganglioneuralgia

Before we speak about Brain Freeze, I have once again been warned by the FCC and other governmental agencies that I must make the following statement:  No matter how enticing - Underage drinking is wrong. Frozen drinks may be refreshing on a hot summer day but alcohol is not an acceptable addition to Slurpees for underage drinkers.



Heavenly hosannas, it is right that we give thanks and praise -  7-11 is celebrating their name day (so to speak) by giving away Slurpees to the "brain freeze" fearless public.


July 11, 1942 -
A classic 40's Merrie Melodies cartoon, Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid was released on this date.



The scene in which Bugs believes part of his body to be skeletal is a reference to Harold Lloyd's execution of the exact same joke in The Freshman.


July 11, 1965 -
One of the 60's best Beach movies, Beach Blanket Bingo opened today.



This was the final full appearance in a "Beach Party" movie for Frankie Avalon. He only appears in six minutes of the follow-up, How to Stuff a Wild Bikini.


July 11, 1969 -
The Rolling Stones released Honky Tonk Women on this date.




Like many Rolling Stones songs, it has highly suggestive lyrics, but they are just subtle enough to keep it from getting banned by radio stations. British Rock Bands often wrote lyrics that were ambiguously offensive, falling just in line with BBC guidelines for airplay. A good example in this song is "She blew my nose and then she blew my mind," which implies both cocaine and sex, but didn't give the BBC any specific reason to ban it.


July 11, 1969 -
Co-incidentially, David Bowie, released his single Space Oddity,  supposedly in conjunction with the July 20th Apollo 11 moon landing, on this date.



Bowie wrote this after seeing the 1968 Stanley Kubrick movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. "Space Oddity" is a play on the phrase "Space Odyssey," and the title does not appear in the lyrics. The song tells the story of Major Tom, a fictional astronaut who cuts off communication with Earth and floats into space.


Today in History:
July 11, 1533 -
The Church of England came into being on this date. The story of its origins is shrouded in sex and therefore important.

Henry VIII assumed the English throne in 1509, an energetic young man of seventeen. He immediately decided to have a male heir. This became the enduring theme of his reign and he consequently came to be known as The Son King (or, to his detractors, The Heir Head.)



Henry such a devout Catholic that he earned the title "Defender of the Faith" without even stepping into the ring. His first wife, whom he'd married before taking the throne, was Catherine of Aragon, who earned the nickname "Catherine of Aragon." Catherine was an excellent queen until she didn't have a son, at which point things changed.



By the 1530s Henry had realized he was married to a bad queen. He was now about 40 years old and therefore decided to get a convertible coach and a new wife.

The convertible caused no problems, but the changing of wives required the official permission of the Pope, who, being Catholic himself, refused to grant a divorce.

Henry divorced her anyway, and on July 11, 1533, the Catholic Church seceded from the Church of England in retaliation.



The Pope having withdrawn, Henry made himself the head of the Church of England. Because he was still the Defender of the Faith, he wrote the Act of Supremacy. This Act proved that the Church of England was better than the Catholic Church, that King Henry VIII was better than any Pope, and that a Single White King was back in the market.

Sir Thomas More had been the Lord Chancellor of England, and knew Henry as well as any man alive. He therefore refused to swear to the Act of Supremacy, and on July 6, 1535, became Sir Thomas Somewhat Less.

At this point in his career, Henry began marrying and divorcing women on a regular basis. The divorce process was expedited now that Papal authority was no longer a consideration. In fact, Henry turned the entire process into a game: his wives would be blindfolded and asked to produce a male heir.



It came to be known as "Bluff King Hal," and several centuries later it served as the inspiration for the popular French game, "Hungry Hungry Guillotine."


July 11 1804 -



Former Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton and sitting Vice President Aaron Burr duel in Weehawken, New Jersey after Hamilton allegedly slandered Burr during a political dinner in New York. Hamilton was shot in the liver and died the next day.



Meanwhile, Burr lives on to finish his term in office and is eventually tried for treason after attempting to raise an army and seize land for himself, either in Mexico or the Louisiana Territory.


July 11, 1859 -
Charles Dickens' novel, A Tale of Two Cities was published on this date.



The book, would become the best-selling, original English language novel of all time, with more than 200 million copies sold.


July 11, 1893 -
Japanese businessman Kokichi Mikimoto perfected his technique for creating hemispherical cultured pearls, producing the world's first cultured pearl on this day.



In the next 12 years, he would hone his technique, making spherical pearls that were indistinguishable from the perfect specimens rarely found in nature.


July 11, 1936 -
The Triborough Bridge in New York City was opened to traffic, on this date.



Built at the height of the Great Depression, the creation of the Triborough Bridge put thousands of struggling people to work. It also was New York City’s first bridge specifically designed for automobiles.


July 11, 1979 -
The derelict space station Skylab finally returned to Earth, ignominiously breaking into 500 separate fragments which are swallowed by the Indian Ocean. That was, except for the ones which crashed into Woorlba Sheep Station, near Balladonia in Western Australia.



Shortly thereafter, President Jimmy Carter telephoned the prime minister of that country to apologized for scattering NASA litter on his nation.

Oops.


July 11, 1997 -
Bodybuilder and wannabe actor Jonathan Norman was arrested for trespassing on Steven Spielberg's estate in Malibu, California on this date. Believing that the film director "wanted to be raped," Norman had brought along a kit containing handcuffs, duct tape, nipple clamps, chloroform, and a stun gun.

I never realized that Steven liked nipple clamps, he seemed more like a vibrating egg man to me.



And so it goes.