Question: When you shopping in the Tokyo neighborhood called Akihabara, what are you most-likely looking to buy?

Yesterday’s Question answered below: Before Google was a gigantic global internet service, what was a google?
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History for 10/1/2021
Welcome to Month Number 8, Octubrius to the Romans. In 138AD the Roman Senate wanted to rename month Faustina, after the wife of the Emperor Antoninus Pius. But she being a rare modest empress, declined the honor.

Birthdays: Vladimir Horowitz, Walter Matthau, Richard Harris, Phillipe Noiret, James Whitmore, Pres. Jimmy Carter is 97, Everett Sloane, Rod Carew, Stanley Holloway, Tom Bosley, Randy Quaid, Cindy Margolis, Brie Larson, Zack Galifanakis is 52, R.O. Blechman is 91, Brie Larson is 32, Julie Andrews is 86

522BC- The Magiophonia, the Massacre of the Magi. When the high priest of the Persian priesthood, the Magi, attempted to usurp the throne, the Great King of Persia Darius killed him and ordered a general massacre of Magi priests. Greek writer Herodotus wrote: 'This day was celebrated each year as the feast of Magophonia or the day of the slaughter of the magi...the Persians observe this day with one accord, and keep it more strictly than any other in the whole year...this day is the greatest holy day that all Persians alike keep.'" By Jesus’ time, the Magi were much more circumspect in their ambitions, and merely stuck to astronomy and spiritual matters.

331BC- BATTLE OF GAUGAMELA or Arbelum - Alexander the Great's victory over the Persian army of King Darius IV. Darius had sought to once and for all destroy this Greek troublemaker by assembling an enormous army from all over his kingdom. But this multinational, polyglot force had no cohesion, and the disciplined Macedonian-Greek veterans knifed through their ranks. Alexander ordered his elite Companion Cavalry to make right for King Darius, since he was the only thing holding his army together. Darius had to run for his life, and so his army broke up soon after seeing him fleeing. The Persian Empire collapsed and Alexander soon captured his capitol and family.

326 A.D. Christian Emperor Constantine banned sentencing criminals to gladiator schools, effectively phasing out gladitorial combat. The Games continued on a little while longer using prisoners of war, but all the fun and professionalism had gone out of it. The last recorded bout in Rome was in 407AD.

Today is the Feast of Saint Bavo of Ghent, who begged one of his former servants to drag him by a chain around his neck because of what a cruel master he was before his conversion to Christianity.

1202- To the sound of massed trumpets and singing the hymn Veni Creator Spiritus, the knights of the Fourth Crusade left by ship from Venice for the Holy Land.

1273- German Electors choose Duke Rudolph of Hapsburg as Holy Roman Emperor. The Hapsburg family was the most successful dynasty in Europe. They remained in power (with one or two interruptions) for 645 years, finally being deposed in 1918. When a Hapsburg chided Napoleon for having no royalty in his blood, he snapped back" I prefer to be the Rudolph of my race!' The last heir to the Austrian Empire, Dr. Otto von Hapsburg, died at age 98 in 2003.

1791- The first day of the French Legislative Assembly, the second French parliamentary body after the Assembly National that had started the French Revolution adjourned itself. In this assembly for the first time the conservatives sat on the right side of the hall, the liberals on the left side and the moderates in the center. This gives us the designation today used around the world for political Leftists and Right Wingers.

1800- By the secret Treaty of San Idelfonso Spain returned Louisiana to France in exchange for the Italian Duchy of Parma. Spain had owned Louisiana for her part in the French and Indian War (Seven Years War) victory. Napoleon needed it back for his planned worldwide colonial challenge to Britain. But when Santo Domingo revolted against French rule and Nelson sank the French navy Napoleon soured on his colonial plans. He decided to sell Louisiana to the one country he knew would annoy the British most, the United States. And Spain never did get Parma.

1810- The first Berkshire Cattle Show.

1857- Gustav Flaubert's Madame Bovary premiered in magazine installments. Flaubert was tried for pornography because of it, but acquitted.

1880- John Phillip Sousa was named leader of the Marine Corps Band and began his career as the March King.

1903- First World Series of Baseball. The Boston Pilgrims had lost the first game today to the Pittsburgh Pirates 7-3, even though Cy Young was the starting pitcher. But Boston went on to win the series in best of nine games. There was no 1904 World series because the owners couldn't agree on a format.

1908- Ford announces the Model "T" the "Tin Lizzie" the first mass-produced affordable car. It was called the Model T because it took Twenty prototypes to perfect it. The Model T cost $825, paid on installments with as little as $10 down. Its top speed was 45 miles and hour and 15 million were sold. When they asked Henry Ford what color should it be, he replied: "Any color so long as it's black.' The auto goes from being a rich mans plaything to something every home could afford.

1910- A bomb blew up the L.A. Times building, killing 23 people. The Times had a hostility to unions, and two union organizers the McNamara Brothers were arrested.
Despite having Clarence Darrow as a lawyer they were convicted, possibly because halfway through the trial the brothers confessed they did it, and Darrow had to beat a charge of jury tampering. As the MacNamaras were hanged they shouted 'Hurrah for Anarchy!'

1919- THE FIX IS IN- First game of the 'fixed' world series. The Chicago White Sox had the best team in baseball at the time but Charles Comisky paid them wages lower than most minor league teams. They were nicknamed the Black Sox because Comisky was too cheap to pay for laundering their uniforms. So this year five players accepted bribes from gangster Arnold Rothstein to throw the world series. Pitcher Eddie Cicotte, who spent much of the previous night sewing $10,000 into the lining of his overcoat, at first threw a perfect fastball strike, then hit the batter in-between the shoulder blades on the next pitch- a signal to the gangsters that "The Fix was In" Cincinnati won this game 9 -1 and eventually the series.
The scheme was uncovered a year later and Baseball Commissioner Judge Kennesaw Mountain Landis banned all the accused Sox players from ever playing again.

1923- The first football game in the L.A. Coliseum- USC defeated Pomona.

1931- Construction completed on the new Waldorf Astoria Hotel. The original Waldorf Astoria from the XIX Century was demolished to make way for the Empire State Building. The new Waldorf boasted the Waldorf Towers, where kings, presidents and other Hoi-Paloi could enter by a private lobby and stay for weeks at a time. Old president Herbert Hoover was a long time resident. Their restaurant was where The Waldorf Salad was created.

1932- Babe Ruth's "Called" Home Run. Ruth was hitting against a Chicago Cubs pitcher when he pointed with his bat towards right field. He then swung his bat and hit a home run over the right wing bleachers.

1937- After heavy lobbying by millionaire publisher William Randolph Hearst the first Federal law banning Marijuana goes into effect. The law was sought chiefly by southwestern states, that wanted to have any excuse to deport Mexican immigrants. Plus Hearst had many powerful paper manufacturers behind him who wanted wood pulp to be the chief source of paper products rather than hemp, which grows, well…. like a weed.

1942-The test flight of America’s first experimental jet aircraft- the XP59A Comet.

1943-THE DANISH MIRACLE- This day the Nazis were to begin deporting Denmark's Jewish population to death camps. The Danish people meanwhile had quietly smuggled the entire Jewish population to the coast and onto ferries to neutral Sweden. The Germans only found a few hundred stragglers. Earlier in a show of defiance when the Nazi authorities ordered all Jews to wear a large yellow Star of David, every Danish citizen including the King wore one.

1944- Nazis doctors in Buchenwald concentration camp began conducting experiments on homosexuals.

1945- Looney Tunes director Frank Tashlin left the cartoon business to work full time as a screenwriter at Paramount on live action movies. He wrote for the Marx Brothers and later directed the Dean Martin Jerry Lewis comedies.

1946- NUREMBERG-The verdicts read in the International Military Tribunal Trials of top Nazi war criminals. Herman Goering, Hans Franck, Jodl and 8 others got death sentences, their bodies later to be burned in the very crematoriums they created. Others like Rudolf Hess life prison terms. Admiral Doenitz, the leader of the U-Boats, got a lighter sentence by appealing to US Admiral Nimitz. Nimitz admitted that US submarines sinking the Japanese merchant marine learned their stuff studying the German tactics. Japanese submarines never sunk US cargo ships because sinking other than a war ship was considered dishonorable.
Senator Robert Taft was a leading Republican Senator who pointed out that even though the Nazis were evil and deserved punishment, the Nuremberg trials had no legal precedent and were against the U.S. Constitution's guarantee against ex-post-facto – after the fact, laws. Technically speaking, there were no such laws like Crimes Against Humanity at the time, so how could anybody be convicted of violating them? Intriguing, but not a popular argument. Taft was being considered for a presidential run in 1948 until these statements ruined his career. John F. Kennedy put him in his book Profiles of Courage.

1947-THE BIRTH OF THE BURBS- William Levitt's postwar dream, a planned community of affordable pre-fab homes on the outskirts of New York, called Levittown, is born. Mr. and Mrs. Bladykas moved into the first 2 bedroom house, which cost $7,990 bucks. The first true suburb.

1948- After the Israeli War of Independence the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haij Amin Al Husseini gathered many Arab refugees displaced by the fighting and declared a Palestinian State in the North of Israel, in accordance with the UN Resolution. King Abdallah of Jordan rejected this and declared all Palestinian lands not claimed by Israel including the West Bank were part of Jordan. While Arab states lined up on either side to argue, the Palestinians were kept in refugee camps instead of being allowed to assimilate into the populations of the surrounding Arab countries. This confusion in part explains why Israel and other Western nations for many years had trouble understanding Palestinian nationalism. For years Israeli leaders like Golda Meir and Moshe Dayan felt Jordan was the homeland for resettled Palestinians. King Abdallah was assassinated by a Palestinian.

1949- THE EAST IS RED - Mao declared the Peoples Republic of China. "Now Let the World Tremble! " he said. In China today is a holiday –National Day. Contrary to paranoid conservative American politicians who feared the growing global Communist domination, Russian Soviet dictator Stalin hated Mao, and continued to support Chiang Kai Chek’s nationalist government. During World War II, Mao sent his wife to Moscow for safety. Stalin locked her up in a lunatic asylum just to annoy him.

1952- This Is Your Life TV show hosted by Ralph Edwards premiered.

1955- The Honeymooners with Jackie Gleason, Jayne Meadows and Art Carney premiered on TV.

1957- Los Angeles outlaws garbage incineration to try and cut down smog levels. Even though Los Angeles has reduced it's pollution levels by 30% in ten years it still had the worst air in the United States until surpassed by Houston in 1999.

1958- NASA born. The National Aeronautics & Space Agency. The U.S. government takes the space program out of the hands of the military and sets up a civilian space agency to get us into orbit.

1960- The independence of Nigeria.

1962- Johnny Carson took over the Tonight Show, after host Jack Paar walked off the set in a rage and resigned. Paar was annoyed the network censors cut a comedy sketch that featured the sound of a toilet flushing. At first, people were cool to Carson. Even his own mother in Nebraska wasn’t impressed. But by years end Johnny Carson became the king of late night TV, and ruled it for 32 years. Jack Paar later said quitting was the worst mistake of his life.

1963- People who argue that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy take note: It is a fact that this day weeks before the assassination top Mafioso Jimmy Roselli flew from Chicago down to New Orleans to have two secret meetings with Jack Ruby, the man who later shot Oswald. Why would a national crime boss take time to talk with a two-bit strip joint manager?

1964- THE FREE SPEECH MOVEMENT- It’s hard to believe now, but once upon a time most US universities had strict laws against students holding political protests on campus. It changed when this day on the campus of Berkeley, Cal., Jack Weinberg was arrested by Oakland police for distributing Civil Rights pamphlets. A mob of students surrounded the police car he was handcuffed in and would not let it proceed. The crowd held the car for 32 hours as speakers stood on the roof and made speeches denouncing the ban and other issues. The University lifted the ban on public political rallies and set the stage for the Anti-War protest of the 60’s.

1966- Largest demonstrations in China of Mao's Cultural Revolution.

1968- George Romero's film "Night of the Living Dead' premieres. Despite one film critic describing it as,” A bunch of sick crap”, it went on to become a cult hit.

50 Years Ago 1971-Walt Disney World Florida opened to the public.

1982- Disney's EPCOT opens.

1987- The Whittier Earthquake rocks L.A. 5.9 on the Richter Scale, it killed 8 and caused millions in damage.

1992 -The Cartoon Network started.

2009- The Walt Disney Family Museum opened in San Francisco.

2013- The Obamacare sign-up website, Healthcare.gov went on line. It quickly crashed and caused much embarrassment and scoffing from critics of the administration. But eventually it signed up millions of uninsured and slowed the rise of medical costs.

2017- Retired real estate dealer Steven Paddock went to Las Vegas with a car full of legally purchased automatic weapons. From his hotel suite window he sprayed bullets down on the audience of an outdoor rock concert. He shot 480 people, killing 56. Then he killed himself. No motive was ever revealed. No gun control ever considered.
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Yesterday’s Question: Before Google was a gigantic global internet service, what was a google?

Answer: A googol, or google, is 10 to the 100th power. A googol is generally used not as a realistic number itself, but as a frame of reference for other super large numbers.

Question: Before Google was a gigantic global internet service, what was a google?

Yesterday’s Question answered below: What does it mean to have a dichotomy?
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History for 9/30/2021
Birthdays: William Wrigley the Chewing Gum king 1868, Truman Capote, Eli Weisel, Lester Maddox, Buddy Rich, David Oistrach, Deborah Kerr, Angie Dickinson is 90, Marylin McCoo, Len Cariou, Johnny Mathis, Rula Lenska, Eric Stolz, Monica Bellucci is 57, Jenna Elfman is 50, Marion Cotillard is 46, Al Leong (Al KaBong) is 69

331BC- On the night before the Battle of Gaugamela. Alexander the Great made preparations. The Persian Great King had assembled and enormous army of peoples from throughout his vast empire-150,000 Lydians, Scythians, Bactrians, Phoenicians, Ionians, Egyptians, Medes, all to face the Macedonian Greek army of 30,000. Alexander ordered his soothsayer Aristander to offer sacrifices to the God of Fear.

420AD- Today is the feast of Saint Jerome, who first translated all of the Old and New Testaments from Hebrew, Chaldean, Aramaic and Greek into commonly spoken Latin. This is referred to as the Vulgate Edition.

1187- SALADIN CAPTURED JERUSALEM- After destroying the Crusader army at The Horns of Hattin in July, the Sultan of Egypt laid siege to the Holy City. The Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem and Baron Baylin of Ibelin threatened to destroy the Al Aqsa mosque, the Dome of the Rock and other Muslim holy places if Saladin didn't agree to mild treatment of the Christian citizens of the city. Saladin didn't want his name to go down in history with such an infamy, so he agreed. Still, he consoled himself with beheading 3,000 captured Knights Templar (you gotta have some fun). Remember Richard Lionheart had 5,000 Arab people slaughtered just to taunt Saladin. The Queen of Jerusalem, Yolanda DeCourtenay, sister of Baldwin IV 'the Leper King '(deceased), went into exile looking for Western support for more Crusades.

1399- King Richard II abdicated the throne of England for Henry IV Bollingbroke.
He was Henry IV part one, if you're a Shakespeare fan). Henry was the eldest surviving son of John of Gaunt. Richard was the son of his brother Edward the Black Prince. The cousins would wage the War of the Roses a generation later. Richard was later murdered at Pontefract Castle. Richard II is remembered for is the invention of the pocket-handkerchief.

1630- Pilgrim John Billington became the first American hanged for murder. Known as the “Wickedest Pilgrim Father” criminologists call him the first American crook.

1681- Louis XIV of France seized the city of Strasbourg, a city half-German and half-French. The German Emperor considered Strasbourg one of his imperial cities and the stage was set for future Franco-German rivalry. The city would change hands again and again over the centuries until becoming finally French in 1945.

1789- After adopting the Constitution, setting up the Supreme Court and working with the first President, the First Congress of the United States adjourned.

1791- Mozart's opera "Die Zauberflotte, The Magic Flute" premiered at Emanuel Schiknader's theater in Vienna. One of the theories about Mozart's death was that he put too much FreeMason's secret ritual into the story, so that the Masons did him in for violating their secrecy. The Papageno-Papagena duet when they meet at the end was Schiknader's idea. Mozart gave pyrotechnical trills to the coloratura aria of the Queen of the Night, but privately he laughed at such singing as “Cut Up Noodles”.

1791- The French Assembly Nationale, which had been in session since King Louis XVI chased them into a tennis court and tried to disband them two years earlier, dissolved themselves to make way for a new Legislative Assembly to complete the work of converting France from a feudal monarchy to a democratic republic.

1846- Dr. William Morton first pulled a tooth using ether as an anesthetic.

1868- Louisa May Alcott’s novel Little Women first published in installments.

1888- Jack the Ripper murdered two more prostitutes in the Whitechapel area of London, Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes

1896- Explorer Robert Peary returned to New York from the Polar ice bringing the Museum of Natural History a large iron meteorite, and two families of Eskimos (Inuit). Peary had tempted the Inuit with promises of gifts and promised to return them in a year. The Museum housed them in the basement. All but one young boy named Minik died of disease. Minik had been told his father Oiesuk was buried, but in reality the Museum made his skeleton into an exhibit. In 1909 the boy was finally allowed to go home. By then he had wised up. ” I want to leave before you put my brains in a jar, too!”

1919- The Fleischer Brother's first Out of the Inkwell cartoon featuring Koko the Clown. Koko was rotoscoped- meaning traced from live action like Motion Capture does today. Dave Fleischer put on the clown suit and was filmed by his brother Max.

1928- Walt Disney and his crew re-recorded the final soundtrack and music for the first Mickey Mouse short, Steamboat Willie. Walt was unhappy with the sync on first version of the track, and pawned his car for the money to pay for this second session.

1930- Death Valley Days Show premiered on radio, sponsored by Twenty Mule Team Borax powder. When it moved to television in the 50’s the host was Ronald Reagan.

1935- George Gershwin's opera Porgy and Bess premiered at the Colonial Theater in Boston. It flopped originally, but after some rewrites it became a major hit.

1942-THE STAR OF AFRICA- Just prior to the Battle of El Alamein the top German fighter ace Hans Joachim Marseilles The Star of Africa died when his ME 109F caught fire and his parachute didn’t open. Marseilles had shot down 158 aircraft in one and a half years. He was just 22. His marksmanship over the Sahara desert was so good that his wingman was nicknamed “The Adding Machine”, because his only job seemed to be to watch and tally up the enemy planes that Joachim shot down. Because of the desert heat, this ace fought his battles in shorts and white tennis shoes.

1947- The first World Series Game on Television- New York Yankees beat the Brooklyn Dodgers 5-3. Gillette and Ford paid $65,000 to sponsor the entire series.

1952- This Is Cinerama, showcasing the widescreen film process, opened in theaters.

1955- James Dean (24) was killed when his Porsche 550 Spyder crashed head on into a pickup truck driven by college student Donald Turnipseed on Highway 41 outside of Paso Robles, California. Dean was driving 85 mph at dusk without his headlights on, and two hours earlier had been given a ticket for speeding. Until now the American public had only seen him in one movie- "East of Eden" and some TV work. Giant and Rebel Without a Cause had yet to be released, yet the legend endures to this day. In an eerie coincidence, Dean had just filmed a public service announcement promoting automobile safety. His last lines were:” Remember, the life you save may be mine!”

1960- Hanna & Barbera's "The Flintstones" debuted. For six seasons in prime time the inhabitants of 301 Cobblestone Lane, Bedrock, was one of the most successful TV series ever. Originally going to be named the Flagstones, then Gladstones, before Flintstones. Ed Benedicts' designs with Alan Reed as the voice of Fred, Jean Van Der Pyl the voice of Wilma, Mel Blanc doing Barney and Bea Benaderet doing Betty.
The show was so obviously modeled on the live action comedy The Honeymooners, that Jackie Gleason seriously considered suing, especially when two of his old writers went to work for them. But his people dissuaded him, saying if he did, he’s be hated by every child in America.

1962- Three days of bitter rioting climaxed the BATTLE OF OXFORD MISSISSIPPI. James Meredith wanted to be the first black man to enroll in the segregated University of Miss. Governor Ross Barnett, who Time Magazine called “The Worst Racist in the Nation” vowed to keep him out. President John Kennedy pondered the constitutional ramifications of arresting the sitting governor of a state. When Barnett refused to deploy the states’ National Guard Washington sent in Federal marshals and troops to ensure Mr. Meredith could attend classes.
This night for 14 hours huge crowds of segregationist and Klansmen from around the state waving Confederate flags battled authorities with rocks, bottles, guns and tear gas. Two were killed and scores wounded. One federal marshal said: “ I was more scared there than I was at Pearl Harbor!” One of the marshals that night was the son of writer William Faulkner. Next day James Meredith walked to his classes at Old Miss. In later years Meredith became an aide to former segregationist Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina.

1966- British Bechuanaland becomes the Republic of Botswana.

1971- The Baseball Washington Senators played their last game in RFK Stadium. Their fans rioted and threw so much trash on to the field that the game was declared a forfeit. The Senators moved to Texas and became the Texas Rangers.

1982- The TV comedy Cheers premiered. The Beacon Street Bar in Boston where everybody knows your name. It made stars of Ted Danson, Woody Harrelson, Kirstie Alley and Kelsey Grammar.

1990- READ MY LIPS! President George Bush Sr made the cornerstone of his policy the fact that he’d never raise taxes- He declared “Read my lips, no new taxes!” Well today he went back on his word and announced a hefty tax increase of $134 billion. When a spokesman was called on this obvious flip-flop he responded:” The Presidents position has Evolved.” So did the American public’s view of Bush, they voted him out of office.

2021- The Academy Museum of the Motion Picture opened to the public.

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Yesterday’s Question: What does it mean to have a dichotomy?

Answer: a division or contrast between two things that are or are represented as being opposed or entirely different. Like “ dichotomy between science and mysticism.”

Question: What does it mean to have a dichotomy?

Yesterday’s Question Answered below: Who were the Keystone Cops?
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History for 9/29/2021
Birthdays: Roman general Pompey Magnus, Miguel de Cervantes, Admiral Horatio Nelson, Rudolph Diesel (inventor of the engine), Enrico Fermi, Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Autrey, Lech Walesa, Stanley Kramer, Bryant Gumbel, Greer Garson, Michelangelo Antonioni, Ian McShane, Anita Ekberg, Andrew Dice-Clay, cartoonist Russ Heath, Tom Sizemore, Emily Lloyd is 52, Silvio Berlusconi, Stephanie Miller is 60

In the Medieval calendar this was The Feast of Mickelmuss or MichaelMass. In Old London this was the beginning of the winter lighting season when every tenth store had to maintain a candle in a street lamp, and light it after dark, until Lady Day, March 25th.

440 A.D. -Pope Leo the Great consecrated. He was the pope who turned away Attila the Hun from the gates of Rome.

1066-WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR LANDS IN ENGLAND. When King Edward the Confessor died childless, he left the throne up for grabs. Earl Harold son of Godwin promised Duke William of Normandy that he would step aside and let him be king. But later Harold took the crown for himself. So Duke William invaded with 30,000 Norman knights. Duke William was an illegitimate son of Robert the Devil. He was called William the Bastard until the conquest, then he became William the Conqueror.
When William's ship landed at Pevensey Beach near Dover, Duke William leapt out into the surf to be the first to set foot in Britain. However in front of the whole army he stumbled and fell to his knees. Quickly realizing that if he didn't act fast the men would regard this as a dangerously bad omen, he grabbed two fistfuls of muddy sand in his clenched fists, raised them up and declared : "Ah Britain! Now I have you!" His men cheered and he went on to victory at Hastings on Oct. 16th.

1529- Phillip the Landgrave of Hesse got together the great Protestant leaders to try and seek a common ground for the anti-Catholic Reformation. Martin Luther met Swiss reformer Ulrich Zwingli at this conference. They couldn’t agree on anything and the meeting quickly fell apart. At the departure, Luther even refused to shake Zwingli’s hand. “Your Spirit is not our Spirit.”

1798- At the court of Naples Admiral Horatio Nelson was given a 40th birthday party by his friend and patron, the British ambassador Sir William Hamilton. At this party Nelson first shows the signs of getting seriously turned on by Hamilton's hot young wife Emma. Sir William was 69, Emma was 30. The party was broken up when Nelson's stepson, who was serving as one of his lieutenants, got so drunk he made a scene.
The love affair between Nelson and Mrs. Hamilton in defiance of all social stigmas scandalized even that notorious age. Yet Sir William Hamilton seemed more interested in his ancient Roman pottery. Hamilton got more upset at the news of a shipload of antique vases sinking, than being told that his wife was shivering the admiral’s timbers.

1829- BOBBIES- Prime Minister the Duke of Wellington had been complaining for years that the city of London needed it's own regular police force instead of relying on irregular militia like the Bow Street Runners or the Horse Guards. At this time sections of North London were so tough they were labeled on maps “No-Go”. On this day London's reorganized police force, The Greater Metropolitan Police Force based at Scotland Yard, went on duty. The constables, because they were formed by Home Secretary Sir Robert Peel, were nicknamed "Bobbie's Boys" or "Bobbies". They’re also nicknamed Old Bill. Some called them Peelers.

1862- THE GENERAL DISTURBANCE- The Yankee army in Tennessee had a morale problem among its senior officers. Major General Bull Nelson got into an argument with Brigadier General Jefferson C. Davis -no relation to the President of the Confederacy. In a hotel lobby Davis confronted the 6' 5", 300 pound Nelson and flung a business card in his face. Nelson bellowed "Get outta my way you puppy!" and slapped him so hard he flew across the room. Whereupon General Davis drew a pistol and shot General Nelson in the chest." Tom, he's murdered me!" Bull Nelson cried as he died. Amazingly Gen. Davis was never tried or court-martialed because he was needed on the battlefield. I guess arguments between nations take precedence. Davis was finally cashiered out of the army when during Sherman's March through Georgia he was accused of destroying a bridge before a crowd of runaway slave families could cross, knowing they would be left at the mercy of the pursuing Confederates.

1913-Rudolph Diesel, inventor of the Diesel engine, celebrated his 55th birthday by jumping off his yacht into the English Channel and drowning himself.

1918- German ally Bulgaria requested an armistice with Britain and France to get out of World War One.

1925- Colonel Billy Mitchell testified to Congress that America needed a large independent Air Force, because the current army and navy heads were too incompetent to grasp its future significance. For these remarks, he was court-martialed and suspended for 5 years. He quit the army in disgust. In Germany, German ace Ernst Udet studied Mitchell’s tactics to develop the dive-bombing. In 1942, when it was obvious that World War II was being decided by air power, Billy Mitchell was reinstated a major general- posthumously. The US Air Force became a separate branch of the military in 1945.

1929- After a summer of fierce rioting between Jews and Arabs in Jerusalem, Nablus, Hebron and Bethlehem, Palestinian leader Oudah Mousah Pashah met with the British Mandate Governor. He warned that if something wasn’t done to curb Jewish desires for nationhood in Palestine, more violence would occur.

1930-Ninety year old writer George Bernard Shaw turned down the offer of a Peerage.

1930- First day of shooting on the Tod Browning horror classic Dracula. Hungarian actor and morphine addict Bela Lugosi played the lead role he had already made famous on stage. Lugosi was identified with the character Dracula for the rest of his life. When he died, he was buried in the Dracula cape.

1933- The movie A Bill of Divorcement introduced the star Katherine Hepburn.

1936- Leaders of the Spanish Fascist Phalange forces vote Gen. Francisco Franco "Il Caudillo- the Leopard", their overall leader, or Generalissimo.

1938- THE MUNICH AGREEMENT- Hitler duped war weary England & France that if he ate Czechoslovakia he would be satisfied. Prime Minister Chamberlain proclaims back home :"Peace in our Time." At the conference at Bertchesgarden the British and French prime ministers never conferred, never even had lunch with each other. And no one would give a hearing to Czech Premier Benes, who’s country after all was being dissolved.
In Germany a conspiracy of top generals lead by an Admiral Canaris were poised to topple Hitler in a coup the moment the news of Britain and France had declared war came from Munich. Instead the news of Hitler bluffing his way peacefully to victory caused the conspiracy to crumble. Around this time American CBS correspondent in Berlin William Shirer reported that those close to Hitler said he had a curious ritual to cope with stress. When the Fuhrer would fly into a rage he would calm himself by dropping to the floor and chewing on the corners of his carpet.

1941- Babi Yar. The Nazis drive the Jewish population of Kiev outside city and murder them in a ravine. Thirty thousand were killed in one day. The Ukrainian population had welcomed the Nazis as liberators from the tyranny of Stalin. For years afterwards the Soviet KGB denied Babi Yar's existence until poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko made the site famous with his poem of the same name.

1953- The television show “Make Room for Daddy” premiered, making a star out of big nosed nightclub entertainer Danny Thomas. The Lebanese Thomas had tried to break into films with no luck. He burst into tears after Columbia studio chief Harry Cohn suggested he get a nose job and forget about it. Danny Thomas spent his big earning years buyiong real estate. At the time of his death he was the richest man in Beverly Hills.

1957- A nuclear reactor explosion in Chyrbtsk Russia released more deadly radiation than Chernobyl, but it was all kept secret until recently.

1959- Hanna Barbera's "Quick Draw McGraw" TV show. Baba Louie and El Kabong!

1961- Russian ballet star Rudolph Nureyev, acclaimed as the greatest dancer of his age, defected to the west in Paris and was granted asylum.

1962- Because of the Independence of Algeria the French Foreign Legion quits their home base at Siddi Abbes forever. They took with them relics like the glass casket containing the wooden hand of Capt. Jean Danjou, killed at Camarone Mexico fighting the Juaristas one hundred years earlier.

1967- The cult TV series The Prisoner premiered.

1969- The TV series Love American Style premiered.

1969- Country singer Merle Haggard released the song “I’m Proud to be an Oakie from Muskogee”. It was a huge hit on the country charts, but more than that, it was a conservative declaration of cultural war of against the urban-hippy, rock & roll counterculture that dominated American media at the time. It crystalized rural anger into an already polarized American public.

1975- The legendary R&B singer Jackie Wilson, collapsed of a heart attack while performing on stage for Dick Clark’s ‘Good Ol’ Rock and Roll Revue’ at the Latin Casino in Cherry Hill, N.J. He lingered in an out of a coma for 8 years, dying in 1984. He was only 49. All the time he was comatose, Dick Clark covered all his medical bills, and kept it a secret. This wasn’t revealed until Clark himself died in 2012.

1976- At his birthday party musician Jerry Lee Lewis accidentally shot his bass player Norman Owens in the chest with his 357 magnum. He said he was using the gun to try and open a soft drink bottle and it accidentally went off. Owens survived and sued Lewis.

1982- Tylenol recalled hundreds of thousands of bottles of capsules after a lunatic laced some with cyanide, killing seven. The killer or killers were never found.

1996- The first Nintendo 64 bit game system, The NES, debuted in the US. It sold 500,000 the first day.

2008- When the Conservative US Congress failed to pass a bail-out bill for the economy wracked by the Great Recession and high gas prices, Wall Street dropped 700 points, at the time the most ever at once.
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Yesterday’s Question: Who were the Keystone Cops?

Answer: In the Silent Film Era, The Keystone Cops were a very popular comedy troop, portraying an incompetent and inept police squad, appearing in a series of comedy shorts in the early days of motion pictures. The films involved elaborate, riotous and seemingly death defying stunts and slapstick.They were named for the production company, Mack Sennett’s Keystone studio.

Today, referring to a group as "Keystone Cops” means their efforts are bumbling, amateurish, unsuccessful or humorously self-destructive. (Thanks FG)

Question: The town of Grasse, just up from Cannes on the French Riviera, is best known for what?

Quiz: The place names in the board game Monopoly like Park Place, Montrose Ave., St. Charles Place, are all taken from one particular American city. What is it?
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History for 9/27/2021
Birthdays: King Stefan Bathory of Poland, Thomas Nast, Arthur Penn, Mike Schmidt,
Meatloaf, William Conrad, Dick Schapp, Samuel Adams, George Cruikshank, Jayne Meadows, Wilford Brimley, Shaun Cassidy, Greg Morris, Amanda Detmer, Avril Lavigne is 37, Gwyneth Paltrow is 49

1538- The Battle of Preveza- The huge navy of German-Spanish Emperor Charles V, Venice, Genoa, the Pope and the Knights of Malta have a showdown with the Great Turkish fleet off Corfu. At one point the Turkish Corsair Barbarossa "Red Beard" tried to lure the Christian ships into the same Bay of Actium where the Roman Augustus defeated Anthony & Cleopatra 1,500 years before. The Turks won the battle but this may have had to do with the fact that the Christian admiral Andrea Doria was a Genoese who didn't mind seeing the Venetians lose.
The one other significant fact of the battle was at one point Turkish galleys surrounded Venice's powerful new warship named 'La Galleon". It bristled with more cannon than anyone had ever seen on one boat. As the Turks attacked with light forecannon and prepared to board, the Venetian commander Carmandiolo ordered all his guns to fire at once- the first Broadside.
The tactics of using armed rowing galleys, which had ruled the Mediterranean since the Anthony & Cleopatra was now obsolete to square rigged sailing ships bristling with guns. The Turkish “Barbary Corsairs” would continue to raid Christian Mediterranean ships for another three hundred years.

1771-Young artist Francisco Goya entered a scholarship competition sponsored by the Art Academy of Parma. He lost to an artist named Bettino. Judges said about Goya’s work: "Crude and ugly colors".

1810- Battle of Bussaco. The Duke of Wellington stopped the French army of one of Napoleons Marshal Massena in Portugal. One of the reasons for Wellington’s successes in Spain and Portugal was he had a top rate intelligence gathering system run by a man named Grant.
Colonel Grant was once captured by the French and imprisoned in the fortress of Verdun. He soon escaped, and while on the run, he paused to spend three weeks partying in Paris! He would brazenly walk down the Boulevard St. Germain in his bright redcoat of His Majesties 11th Foot. When French police would ask him who he was, he would say he was from France’s ally, thehgtr United States Army! Since not many Parisians had ever seen a real American yet, nobody disputed his story. So he got away.

1821- After a ten-year struggle, Spain acknowledged the independence of Mexico. The commander of the last royal army in Mexico, Juan Ituribe, changed sides and tried to become Emperor of Mexico. He was later deposed by young republican officers like Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. One Mexican leader who was killed in the conflict, Francisco Menars, had been a guerrilla chief in Spain fighting Napoleon’s occupying forces.

1854- The first modern steamship disaster. The SS Arctic collided with the SS Vesta in the mid-Atlantic. The captains ordered women & children first into the boats but the crewmen rebelled and took the lifeboats for themselves. 85 lived, 485 died.

1894- New York’s Aqueduct Racetrack, the Big A, opened.

1903- THE WRECK OF OLD 97- The Southern Pacific express jumps the tracks at 90 miles an hour and inspires the first great country music hit. Written in 1924, recorded by everyone from Woody Guthrie to Johnny Cash.

1910- The Black & Decker tool company formed. Starting with the first portable electric drill in 1919 they became the first power tool company.

1919- Entrepreneur Frank Toulet partnered with Oregon restaurant manager Joe Musso to open a new restaurant in the heart of Hollywood. First called Franks Café, then Musso & Frank, it became an important hangout for the movie industry. It is still in the business today, still the same menu, and you can still see Hollywood types having power meetings there where Chaplin and Barbara Stanwyck once sat.

1934- “ I’M SICK OF THIS CAT & MOUSE GAME!” shouted gangster Baby Face Nelson as he was cornered by two FBI agents on a rural road south of Chicago. While his gang and wife looked on in amazement, Baby-Face Nelson boldly walked out in the open, down the middle of the road, his tommy gun blazing away at the G-Men. He was riddled with 17 bullets, but still killed the two feds. Nelson died the next day and was left in a ditch.

1935-13 year old singer Frances Gumm of the singing Gumm Sisters signed an exclusive contract with MGM Pictures. Louis B. Mayer changed Frances’ name to Judy Garland.

1937- J R R Tolkiens’ The Hobbit first appeared in bookshops.

1938- Bob Hope first sang “Thanks For the Memory” on his NBC radio show. It became a hit in his movie appearance in “The Big Broadcast of 1938.”

1939- WARSAW becomes the first world capitol to fall to a Nazi Blitzkreig. The city was surrounded and bombarded for weeks. German generals after the war admitted they had stripped their western front to deal with the unexpected Polish resistance; had the British and French attacked across the Rhine there wouldn’t be much they could do. But the western front stayed quiet, the armies of Democracy mobilized too slowly. As the Polish defenders were slowly wiped out with bombs and shells, Radio Warsaw kept broadcasting Chopin's Revolutionary Etude for Piano over and over as a sign that the city was still alive. Eventually the signal fell silent.

1939- The Mysterious Death of Werner Von Fritsch. Generaloberst Baron Von Fritsch was one of the architects of the rebuilt German Army after the World War defeat and oversaw it’s development into one of the most efficient killing machines in history. But the old Prussian nobleman was never an ardent Nazi and he grew resentful of Hitler’s mad plans for world domination. Hitler had him forcibly retired. This day during the Polish campaign Von Fritsch was reported killed by snipers leading a patrol. Why was a top general staff officer was leading a little patrol out in the middle of nowhere is a mystery. Was Von Fritsch courting death? Was he done in by the Gestapo, and the ambush story made-up?

1940- Germany, Italy and Japan sign a tripartite alliance aimed at the United States. The diplomat who signed for Japan, Mr Kurusu, would later be sent to Washington to discuss peace while Pearl Harbor was being bombed.

1943- THE FOUR DAYS OF NAPLES- Naples was a city known for its tough street gangs. This day in advance of the American armies closing in the city the Neopolitans rose in revolt and fought the Germans with knives, scissors, clubs, rocks, anything they could get their hands on. Young actress Sophia Loren remembered seeing from her window a ten year old boy climb onto a Nazi tank and push a gasoline-bottle bomb through its view slit.

1944- Evangelist Aimee Semple MacPherson died in hospital from an overdose of sleeping pills. She was 53. MacPherson was one of the most powerful evangelists of the 1920s with thousands of followers donating millions of dollars.

1947- Disney’s film Fun and Fancy Free, featuring Mickey and the Beanstalk.

1950- After a week of hard house-to-house fighting the South Korean capitol of Seoul was declared liberated from North Korean occupation.

1954- The Tonight Show premiered. Steve Allen was the first host.

1961- Hanna Barbera's "Top Cat" show premiered. Do you remember the words to the theme song..? "Top Cat, the most effectual- Top Cat, who's intellectual: Close friends get to call him T.C., Providing it's with dignity. Top Cat, the indisputable leader of the gang... He's the Boss. He's a pip. he's the championship, He's the most tip-top, Top Cat !"

1962- Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring was published. The best seller first brought to the public’s eye how indiscriminate use of chemical pesticides, particularly DDT, was damaging the environment and killing off wildlife.

1964- The Warren Commission concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in killing President John F. Kennedy. Today, despite two investigations 8 out of 10 Americans still believe Oswald was part of a conspiracy. Even Lyndon Johnson had his doubts. Documents pertaining to the case, like Oswald's tax returns, and how he could re-enter the U.S. from Soviet Russia without a passport after renouncing his citizenship, are still kept top secret. Evidence like President Kennedy's brain disappeared from the lab and witnesses to contrary theories kept dying from car accidents and karate chops. Maybe we’ll know more when the CIA’s papers on the assassination are unlocked in 2060.

1977- Bob McKimson, Warner animation, director of many Looney Tune shorts, collapsed and died of heart failure in front of Friz Freleng and Yosemite Sam animator Gerry Chiniquy while having lunch. He was 66. Fellow animator Art Leonardi had asked Bob for a souvenir drawing that morning, Bob drew him a Bugs Bunny but as he was leaving Art reminded him that he neglected to sign it. Bob said as he walked out "Oh, I'll get to it after lunch..."

1989- The Japanese corporate giant Sony purchased Columbia Pictures.

1996- The Taliban captured the Afghan capitol of Kabul and established their hardline fundamentalist regime. They were driven out temporarily by the US invasion in 2002, and got back into power in 2021.

2001- While America was still in shock over 9-11 and anthrax attacks, President Bush in a speech at O’Hare Airport stated that although we may be attacked again at any moment, and it may be more horrible than 9-11, the best thing we could do… is to go shopping; “ go to the mall, vacation at Disneyworld….enjoy life the way we want it to be enjoyed….”

2003- Hours after the season’s final concert, in the dead the night, the historic bandshell at the Hollywood Bowl was demolished. After a long legal fight with preservationists, the historic 1929 structure designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, that Gershwin and Stokowski played in, was replaced with a new shell promising better acoustics.
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Quiz: The place names in the board game Monopoly like Park Place, Montrose Ave., St. Charles Place, are all taken from one particular American city. What is it?


Answer: Atlantic City.

Quiz: The place names in the board game Monopoly like Park Place, Montrose Ave., St. Charles Place, are all taken from one particular American city. What is it?

Yesterday’s question answered below: When shopping in London’s Savile Row, what are you specifically looking to buy?
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History for 9/26/2021
Birthdays: George Gershwin, T.S. Elliot, John Chapman (also known as Johnny Appleseed)-1774, Winsor McCay-1869, Theodore Gericault -1791, Olivia Newton-John, Cheryl Tiegs is 73, Marty Robbins, Pope Paul VI, Jack Lalanne, Melissa Sue Andersen, Phillip Bosco, James Cavaziel, Surena Williams, Linda Hamilton is 65.

303AD. Feast of Saints Damian & Cosmas. The Syrian twin doctors were nicknamed 'The Moneyless". They were martyred by being crucified, stoned, shot full of arrows, beheaded, and they had to read their own prescriptions.

1370- Battle of Nicopolis- During a pause in the Hundred Years War with the English, Count Egguerand de Coucy led the cream of French knighthood in one last Crusade to help the king of Hungary defeat the Turks. Instead their army was defeated and their leaders captured. By now Sultan Bajazet (nicknamed Ilderim- Lightning) was so fed up with crusaders, knights and chivalry, that he refused to ransom them, but had them all beheaded.

1529- Sultan Sulieman the Magnificent lays siege to the city of Vienna. At one point he told his troops that if they didn't capture the city he would fill the moat with their genitals. (ouch!) The goal of the Ottoman Empire was the "Completion of the Crescent" . Starting in Turkey the southern side swung out through Palestine, Egypt to the Atlantic. Now the Northern arm must go through Hungary and Austria through France to Spain.

1560- A Spanish expedition under Don Pedro de Ursua left Peru for the deep Amazon. Lost in the limitless rainforest almost all his men die or go mad. The expedition at one point was taken over by a deranged conquistador named Aguirre who declared himself 'Emperor of the Kingdom of El Dorado'! The incident is the subject of Werner Herzog's 1972 movie "Aguirre the Wrath of God".

1575-Writer Miguel de Cervantes was captured by Barbary Pirates and held a slave for five years until his family ransomed him. He wrote Don Quixote in 1604.

1579- Sir Francis Drake in his ship the Golden Hind entered Plymouth Harbor England, after sailing around the world for 33 months. He raided Panama, Peru and visited a strange new place they called Nova Albion and we call California. The Golden Hind was kept in dry-dock in a place of honor for years, until it finally fell to pieces from dry rot.

1687- The Ancient GREEK PARTHENON WAS BLOWN UP during a minor Venetian raid on Turkish held Athens. A random shell ignited a gunpowder magazine the Turks had been storing inside of it. For two thousand years the Greek masterpiece had survived mostly intact. Later on in 1801 English Lord Elgin will back up his frigate to the shore and pry off the frieze marble sculptures for his collection.

1739- THE WAR OF JENKINS EAR- A 9 year war between England and Spain started when a Spanish warship stopped an English merchant ship and cut off the ear of the captain named Robert Jenkins. Jenkins marched around Parliament loudly calling for war and waving his ear in a bottle of spirits. He wore his hair long so some doubted that it was his ear in that bottle.

1820- In Defiance, Missouri, 85 year old frontier scout Daniel Boone died of acute fever and indigestion after eating too many yams. He did all of his exploring without a compass. Someone once asked him - Didn't you ever get lost? He replied, No, but I was once bewildered for three days...

1835- Donizetti’s opera Lucia De Lammermoor premiered.

1863- In a secret meeting, several Confederate generals agree to petition President Jefferson Davis to replace their commander Baxton Bragg. Despite his just winning a victory- Chickamauga. Private soldiers like memoirist Sam Watkins wrote that most of Bragg’s army disliked him. His top cavalry leader, Nathan Bedford Forrest, once got angry enough to draw his sword on him. But Pres. Davis seemed to be the only man who liked Bragg, and kept him in command. Bragg humiliated the mutineers, and the rest of his staff refused to talk to him. Baxton Bragg’s next battle, Missionary Ridge, was a complete disaster and lost most of east Tennessee to the Confederacy.

1887- Emile Berliner patented the gramophone, rejecting Thomas Edison's cylinder in favor of a flat disc record on a turntable.

1892- The John Philip Sousa Band makes its first public appearance.

1914- The Federal Trade Commission, or FTC created.

1918- THE MEUSE ARGONNE OFFENSIVE- To the rally cry of Marshal Foch “Everyone to the Battle!” the Allies began the final mass offensive from Denmark to Switzerland to finish the Germans and end World War I.
The Big Breakout was done by the fresh American divisions thrown forward by Pershing into the Argonne forest. Led by colorful officers like Douglas MacArthur, the Boy Colonel, who led his men calmly across No-Man's Land without a helmet or gun, and dressed in his West Point varsity sweater and cane. There was also artillery Captain Harry Truman and a pushy Lieutenant of a tank brigade named Patton. After fierce resistance, the exhausted German lines finally began to cave in. The offensive had started off in a dense fog. A whole Yank battalion got lost and surrounded by Germans. After being rescued they were hailed as the "Lost Battalion".

1920- The NFL, National Football League, created.

1926- Bullock's Wilshire department store opened. The Tea Room quickly became the in place for Hollywood Society to see and be seen in.

1937- "Queen of the Blues" Singer Bessie Smith died after a car accident in Mississippi. She crashed her Packard into a parked car. She was 43. One account said she died because she was refused treatment in a segregated hospital, but the truth was she was treated by a white doctor at the scene and sent to the nearest hospital, which was a black one.

1939- Nazi scientists led by Rudolph Heisenberg met to discuss how the fission of uranium could be used to create a super bomb. Meanwhile in America, Hungarian scientist Dr. Leo Szilard was warning the US government that they better start an atomic program fast.

1941- Max Fleischer's "Superman" cartoon debuts. They were much more expensive that the usual short cartoons- $90,000 to the usual $40,000, but Paramount wanted them.

1946- In Vietnam, as pro-French and pro-Communists battled in the streets of Saigon, the American O.S.S. representative Col. Peter Dewey wrote back to Washington: “Vietnam is aflame. The French and British are finished here. America should pull out and let the Vietnamese settle their own affairs.” Two days later, on his way to the airport he was ran into an ambush and was killed. The first very American killed in Vietnam.

1955- Eddie Fisher married Debbie Reynolds.

1957- The musical West Side Story opened. The legend goes composer Leonard Bernstein was in the hospital to be operated on for a deviated septum. While recuperating he ran into lyricist Steven Sondheim, who was also recovering from an operation. To pass the time while convalescing they started talking about the idea of an updated Romeo and Juliet set to music in the slums. One early title was Gang Way!

1960-THE NIXON-KENNEDY TELEVISED DEBATE. The first televised presidential debate that really ushered in the era of the "media-candidate". People who heard the debate on radio thought Vice President Nixon had won because he scored more points on issues. But far more who saw it on Television lauded Kennedy because of his cool, calm Presidential bearing as opposed to Nixon's pale sweaty-lipped nervousness.
As he watched the debate on TV, Nixon’s running mate, Senator Henry Cabot-Lodge III, murmured “ We’re gonna lose…” For years Nixon put down his electoral defeat to the fact that he refused stage makeup before going on camera.
One New York Times analyst referred to Kennedy & Nixon as the Roadrunner & Wile E. Coyote of American politics.

1961- Nineteen year old folk singer Bob Dylan made his debut in a Greenwich Village coffee house Gerde’s Folk City.

1961- Fidel Castro gave a speech to the United Nations that lasted 4 and 1/2 hours.

1962- The Beverly Hillbillies debuts. The story goes that CBS mogul William Paley disliked farm-humor type shows, and this project was greenlit behind his back, while he was on vacation.

1964- The premiere of Gilligan’s Island. The good ship Minnow was named for Newton Minnow, the FCC Chairman who first called television “A Vast Wasteland”. Actress Natalie Schafer, who played the wife of millionaire Thurston Howell III, really was a millionaire. She took the role just for the free trip to Hawaii.

1983- Stanislav Petrov saved the world. At this time, America and Russia had the nuclear capability to destroy all life on Earth 23 times over. During the deadly game of nuclear brinksmanship, there were some close-calls. This day Soviet Air-Defense Ministry officer Stanislav Petrov received an alarm that the US had fired 5 nuclear missiles at Russia. Petrov had only a few moments to decide if the alarm was real, and alert for a full counterstrike. But he reasoned, “ Why only 5?” He guessed it was a false alarm, which it was.

1987- A market research group called Q-5 tried to use a bank of computers number-crunching demographic surveys to design the ultimate safe, wholesome, politically-correct children's show. They came up with "The Little Clowns of Happytown"-. Of the 26 children's series in syndication it remained dead last in ratings, He-Man, Jem and G.I. Joe on top. The people have spoken.

1990- The Motion Picture Association changed the rating for the naughtiest movies from X to NC-17.

2001- While the ruins of the World Trade Center were still warm, Pres. George W. Bush asked Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to draw up military plans to attack Iraq, a nation that had nothing to do with the 9-11 attacks.

2004- Florida gets hit with its fourth hurricane in six weeks. Hurricane Jean killed 6 and caused billions in damage. The last time Florida was hit by that many hurricanes was in 1886.
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Yesterday Quiz: When shopping in London’s Savile Row, what are you specifically looking to buy?

Answer: A gentlemen’s hand-tailored suit. Since 1735.