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September 25th, 2010 sat
September 25th, 2010

Quiz: What is an opus? ( Hint, it’s not just the talking Penguin in the comic strip Bloom County.).

Yesterday’s Question Answered below” American states are represented by two senators, but representation in the House is allotted by population. How many states have two senators in Congress but only one House member?
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History for 9/25/2010
Birthdays: William Faulkner, Jean Phillipe Rameau, Mark Rothko, Dmitri Shoshtakovich, Sergei Bondarchuk, Phil Rizzutto the Scooter, Bob MacAdoo, Heather Locklear, Scotty Pippin, Christopher Reeve, Mark Hamill, Glen Gould, Barbera Walters, Red Smith, Aldo Ray, Will Smith is 42, Michael Douglas 66 & Catherine Zeta-Jones-41

1493- Christopher Columbus sailed from Cadiz for the New World on his second trip, this time with seventeen ships. He had been named Governor General of the Indies and Admiral of the Ocean Seas.

1513- Vasco Nunez de Balboa emerged from the Panamanian rain forest to view the great expanse of the western ocean. He calls it "Pacific" the "Peaceful Ocean."

1690- The first American newspaper published in Boston; " Publick Occurances Both Foreign and Domestick, Issue Number One" There was no number two because the Lord Governor of Massachusetts colony promptly closed it down.

1777- British Lord Howe after defeating Washington's army CAPTURED THE AMERICAN CAPITOL OF PHILADELPHIA. The rebel congress had picked up their Declaration of Independence and hightailed it for Harrisburg.
It was the American's luck that at this time the colonies were so loosely knit and decentralized that losing the "nation's capitol" wasn't very important to anyone except Philadelphians. Town Loyalists had a field day routing out rebel sympathizers. Because the Quakers espoused non-violence everyone thought they were on the other side, so they were singled out for especially rough treatment- pelted with stones, tar & feathers, etc.
Lord Howe complained to London that by now he had defeated the American army several times and captured it's capitol yet the Rebellion showed no signs of dying out. America only had four major cities, Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Charleston and they all had been captured by His Majesties forces at one time or another. Except for little pirate John Paul Jones and a ship or two they had sunk most of the American Navy. But the Yankees wouldn’t give up. Obviously a military solution to the American problem was not the answer." I can only pacify the colonies if I had two soldiers for every colonist." London responded by replacing Lord Howe.

1789- James Madison proposed a series of ten amendments be added to the new Constitution guaranteeing basic personal freedoms, the BILL OF RIGHTS. This day it was approved by Congress and sent to the states for ratification.

1828- Simon Bolivar the Liberator is confronted by assassins sent by his own vice president to kill him. They break in on him while he was in bed with his mistress, Manuela Spenz. Bolivar does not fight nor flee, he just stared them down, and the sheer force of his iron will compelled the cutthroats to flee in terror.

1840- Slavery outlawed in California- except.....Indian children were bought and sold for another ten years.

1887-The first Sears Catalog published.

1888- The beginning of the Sherlock Holmes adventure the Hound of the Baskervilles.

1890- Spurred on by the writings of John Muir and John Wesley Powell, Congress created Yosemite National Park in California.

1911- Groundbreaking in Boston for Fenway Park.

1919- President Woodrow Wilson suffers a stroke after a speech at Pueblo, Colorado. For two months he lingered paralyzed while the Nation was run by first lady Edith Wilson. No one told the public or the Vice President. Their are many interpretations of how the government was run in those weeks. Edith claimed to be passing on Wilson's wishes to the government from his sickbed, but many thought Wilson was too incapacitated even for that and she was just doing it herself.

1933- Young writer John Huston was driving drunk on Sunset Blvd when he struck and killed a pedestrian. His father Walter Huston was a top movie star, so to avoid scandal MGM head Louis B. Mayer paid $46,000 bux to cover it up. John Huston went on to become a great Hollywood director and screenwriter.

1953- Alfred Hitchcock wrapped filming on his only 3D film, Dial M for Murder.

1957- President Eisenhower sends the bayonet wielding 101st Airborne to enforce the integration of Central High School in Little Rock Arkansas after the governor refused to use the National Guard. Ike was not exactly colorblind himself but the Supreme Court ordered school desegregation, and to the old general orders were orders. Escorted by troops nine black students entered the school through hordes of jeering whites. One girl was spit on so many times she had to wring her dress out in a sink afterwards.

1965- The Beatles cartoon show premiered.

1974- THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT.- Scientists first warn that increased use of florocarbons and aerosol sprays will cause global weather changes.
I’m sure glad we did something…

1980- John Bonham of Led Zeppelin was found dead of alcohol poisoning.

1984-THE RUBBERHEADS STRIKE- Disneyland workers including the actors who stroll the park in big Mickey and Goofy heads go on strike.
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Yesterday’s Question: American states are represented by two senators, but representation in the House is allotted by population. How many states have two senators in Congress but only one House member?

Answer: Seven states only have one Representative in the House. Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Delaware, Vermont and Alaska. By contrast NY has 29, California 53 Congresspeople.


September 24th, 2010 friday
September 24th, 2010

Question: American states are represented by two senators, but representation in the House is allotted by population. How many states have two senators in Congress but only one House member?

Yesterdays Quiz: Was Uncle Sam a real person?
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History for 9/24/2010
Birthdays: Roman Emperor Vitellius, Duke Albrecht Wallenstein, Chief Justice John Marshall, Francis Scott Key, Jim Henson, F. Scott Fitzgerald, George Raft, Chief Joseph, Sheila MacCrae, Anthony Newley. Phil Hartman, Mean Joe Greene, Linda MacCartney, Pedro Almodovar, Jim Henson, Brad Bird is 53.

1561- Mary Queen of Scots first met Presbyterian reformer John Knox. The beautiful young monarch, reared in Catholic France, attempted to win the sour old preacher to her side. Historian Unfortunately Knox was not impressed by Mary’s personal charm and howled against her entire reign. He thought women as rulers were “an abomination in the sight of God.” When she was deposed and imprisoned in England he wrote Queen Elizabeth Ist constantly urging Mary be beheaded. John Knox also called Queen Elizabeth a beast and whore.

1688- King Louis XIV of France declared war on Germany and moved his armies towards the Rhine. This had the unexpected consequence of deciding who became King of England. Dutch Prince William of Orange was waiting for the opportunity to invade and overthrow his father-in-law King James II Stuart, who many English despised for being a Catholic. But William would never have dared such a move if Louis and his large French Navy who were allies of James, were watching him. Once Louis turned his attention eastward, William crossed the Channel with no trouble. William overthrew James in short order and became King William III of England.

1789- Congress passes the First Judiciary Act, which calls for an Attorney General and a Supreme Court. John Jay was first Chief Justice. When Washington formed the first cabinet, Thomas Jefferson asked if he could be Attorney General as well as Secretary of State, because representing a little country with no foreign policy was boring and had nothing to do.

1869- BLACK FRIDAY- A scheme by robber barons Big Jim Fisk and Jay Gould to corner the US gold market backfired into a major financial panic. The two tycoons had thought they had convinced the gullible President Ulysses Grant into halting sale of government bullion. The night before Gould tried to bribe Grants brother-in-law James Corbin with $100,00 to ensure the President wouldn’t change his mind. But Grant smelled a rat and ordered millions in Federal gold put on the market to bring the prices down. Gold hoarders saw their investment shrink overnight. This day the value of gold dropped in three hours from $160 and ounce to $34. Up in the special part of the N.Y. Stock Exchange nicknamed the Gold Room, dozens speculators were ruined. One investor ran up and down shouting “Shoot Me! Someone Shoot Me!” “Let each man drag out his own corpse.”-Gould later testified. Jay Gould recovered and died in 1892 worth $70 million In 1872 Big Jim Fisk was shot dead in the lobby of the Grand Central Hotel by a jilted suitor of Fisk’s mistress actress Josie Mansfield. And Grant the Civil War hero was labeled a financial dunce by Washington insiders.

1890- Under pressure from the US Government the Mormon Church officially renounced polygamy.

1906- Teddy Roosevelt designated Devils Tower Wyoming as our first national monument. Like all conservationists Teddy’s desire to preserve natural resources was blocked by Congressmen lobbied by rich developers. So he circumvented Congress and created sanctuaries like Devils Tower and Pelican Island by Presidential Executive Order.

1934- Frank Thomas’s first day as a Walt Disney Animator. His last was in 1978.

1936- Babe Ruth's last appearance in a baseball game. Yankees lost to Boston 5-0.

1936- Noel Coward's play 'Private Lives' opened.

1938- Bob Clampett's cartoon "Porky in Wackyland" ( Foo!)

1938- Tennis champion Dan Budge won the US Open in Forrest Hills. Budge became the first person to win all four major tennis meets in one year- Wimbledon, French Open now called Roland Garros, Australian Open and US Open

1941- This day the Japanese Consul in Honolulu was instructed by the Imperial War Ministry to quietly begin gathering information about the US Fleet in Pearl Harbor.

1944- President Franklin Roosevelt had been criticized by Republican Congressmen for wasting money in needless wartime excesses. This day he defeated his critics with humor when they accused him of sending a Navy destroyer to the Aleutian Islands just to retrieve his lost Scottie dog Fallah. He said in a speech” Now I am used to personal attacks, My family is used to personal attacks, but Fallah- isn’t.(laughter) He’s Scottish, you know….and he hasn’t been the same dog since.”

1953- US Army scientist Frank Olsen jumped out of a NY hotel window to his death after getting high on LSD given him as part of a CIA monitored program. Olsen’s widow sued twenty years later when she finally found out the circumstances of her husbands death.

1953-UPA's "Unicorn in the Garden" directed by Bill Hurtz, based on the cartoon style and story by James Thurber.

1953- The movie "The Robe" premiered, the first movie in CinemaScope. It's success was part of a wave of 'Sword & Sandal" epics and fostered many imitation wide screen processes- Superama,VistaVision, Dynarama, WarnerVision, TotalScope-etc. Paramount had experimented with VistaVision starting in the '30's. A colleague bought a number of their prototype cameras, beautiful pieces of machinery, no two exactly alike. There had been earlier experiments with wide screen - Abel Gance's 1925 Napoleon, which used three 35mm images shown simultaneously, and Cimmarron, which was a true wide screen 70mm film starring a very young John Wayne, released in 1930. It was superceeded by 1967 by the more advanced Panavision lens. Today in Hollywood we still call a wide screen picture a "Scope" picture.

1955- President Eisenhower suffered a major heart attack while playing golf. Secretary of State Allen Foster Dulles and other White House staffers run things without even telling Vice President Nixon.

1960- The first nuclear powered aircraft carrier, USS Enterprise is launched.

1960- The "Howdy Doody Time" children's show was canceled after a thirteen year run. The show remains a pivotal memory in the minds of thousands of American baby-boomers who grew up in the fifties. As the last song and the last credits rolled by, just before the cameras switched off, Clarabell the mute clown goes up to the lens and in a haunting voice said; "Goodbye, Kids."

1968- T.V. show "60 Minutes" debuts. Mike Wallace was pared with Harry Reasoner. The show was originally aired Tuesday nights at 10PM and fared poorly in the ratings. When it was moved to Sundays at 7:00PM it became a weekly institution.

1977- The TV series “The Love Boat “debuted.

1988- The Godfather of Soul Music James Brown got a little crazy sometimes. This day he burst into his office complex in Georgia waving a pistol and shotgun and demanded everyone stop using his washroom! After locking the bathrooms he led police on high speed chase through Georgia and South Carolina, only stopping when the cops shot out his tires. He rode the rims till they collapsed. James Brown did 2 years for being under the influence of drugs. Hay!
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Yesterday’s Quiz: Was Uncle Sam a real person?

Answer: Yes, there was a custom’s inspector on the New York State border with Canada in 1812 named Sam Wilson who was nicknamed Uncle Sam by the other workmen. He stamped US on approved goods, and the name stuck. The famous image comes from a World War One recruiting poster. It was a variation of the British one of Earl Kitchener saying Your Country Wants You. Artist James Montgomery Flagg created Uncle Sam as a version of a popular minstrel entertainer named Dan “Daddy” Rice , and used his own face as a model for the final touches.


Sept 23rd, 2010 thur
September 23rd, 2010

Quiz: Was Uncle Sam a real person?

Yesterday’s Question Answered Below: Greek-American actor Telley Savalas 1922-1994( Kojak) had a granddaughter that is pretty famous today. Who is she?
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History for 9/23/2010
Birthdays: Euripides-484BC, Victoria Woodhull, Walter Lippmann, Ray Charles, John Coltrane, Mickey Rooney is 90, Julio Inglesias, Bruce Springsteen, Walter Pidgeon, Louise Nevelson, Jason Alexander, Mary Kay Place, Harry Connick Jr, William McGuffey*

*McGuffey was the educator and author of "the McGuffey Readers", a standard school textbook so successful, that by 1860 the U.S. had an 80% literacy rate.

480 BC THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS- Themistocles and the Athenian fleet defeated the giant armada of Xerxes the Great King of Persia and threw back his invasion. Xerxes was so angry he had his top Phoenician captains beheaded. This battle assured the Golden Age of Greek culture would flourish uninterrupted with democratic Athens at its’ center. The playwright Aeschylus fought in the ranks and Sophocles led the chorus of nude boys dancing and singing in the victory celebrations. Themistocles laid the foundation for Athenian power by insisting she built a large navy rather than an army and concentrate on trade rather than territorial conquest. But Themistocles liked to make money too, and used his offices to pad his fortune, which eventually got him exiled. But not before in another moment of originality he set himself up histories first known foreign bank account as a private slush fund. Aeschylus in his old age was supposedly killed by an eagle who dropped a turtle upon his head, mistaking his bald skull for a rock. Ouch.

Greek Chronicles tell us that also on this same day in 480 BC- Glycon of Syracuse defeated the huge Cathaginian host of Hamilcar and saved Sicily for Greece. Hamilcar spent the battle burning up animal sacrifices to the Gods for good omens. When he saw he was losing Hamilcar threw himself on the fire. Not a bad solution because Carthage’s tradition was to crucify generals who lost battles.

1779- "I HAVE NOT YET BEGUN TO FIGHT !" Captain John Paul Jones on the U.S.S. BonHomme Richard defeated the larger British H.M.S. Serapis in an epic sea duel off Cape Falmouth, England. The two ships grappled each other side by side, pounded away with heavy cannon and fought hand-to-hand. The ships were so close that men could jump through the gun portals from one ship to another. At one point Bonhomme Richard was burning from stem to stern, sinking and all her guns out of action. But John Paul Jones refused to give up. The American crew thought their pint-sized Scots captain had lost his reason. When gunnery Ensign Grubb tried to haul down the Stars & Stripes Jones knocked him down with a pistol butt. English Captain Pearson overheard Jones arguing with his officers about surrender and called aloud "Sir, do you strike your colors, sir?" That’s when John Paul Jones shouted his famous retort: "I have not yet begun to fight!"

To make matters worse the other American ship in the area the USS Alliance was manned by a jealous captain named Launnay. He ordered a broadside fired into the Bonhomme Richard! Launnay hoped that by helping the Englishman kill Jones he could then finish off the Briton and take all the credit for the victory. Jones personally ran over to a ten pounder cannon whose crew had been killed, loaded it and fired it himself, bringing down the Serapis’ mainmast.
Finally it was English Captain Pearson who gave up. The Bon Homme was so shot to pieces it sank so the victors had to ride home on the Serapis. The point of the battle for Jones was trying to raid a British merchant convoy, and the convoy got away, but the symbolic victory to Americans and French was significant. John Paul Jones became a legend on the English Channel. In 2002 the wreck of the Bonhomme Richard was discovered 7 miles off the English coast and is being explored.

1780-"TREASON MOST FOUL !" General Benedict Arnold, fed up with being ignored for promotion by the American high command, planned to change sides by betraying West Point to the British. This was the huge American fortress that would give Britain control of the Hudson River and so split the rebellious colonies in half. Major John Andre' of British intelligence had a meeting with Arnold and was passing back through the lines when he was apprehended by some Yankee militia. These rascals skulked between the armies robbing anyone who chanced their way but when they discovered incriminating documents in his boot they turned Andre over to the authorities. Because Andre was out of uniform he was hanged as a spy. This morning Benedict Arnold found out Andre had been arrested and the jig was up just as George Washington, Alexander Hamilton and Lafayette were riding over for breakfast !
Arnold escaped to the warship HMS Vulture waiting down river while his wife Peggy stalled Gen. Washington and party in the parlor. When Washington learned of Arnold's treason and freaked Peggy feigned a fit of hysterics. Disheveled, with her baby at her breast she shrieked to the horrified Washington :"They're putting hot irons in my Head! Hot irons in my Head!!". She was put to bed and later slipped away to safety. It wasn't known until 1930 when British Army Intelligence documents were made public that loyalist Peggy Arnold was not only deep in the scheme but had been the chief inspiration of Arnold's changing sides. When Peggy died in London of old age, a locket containing the picture of Major Andre was found around her neck..

1803- Battle of Assaye- The Maharatta Rajahs of the Deccan are defeated by a young British general named Arthur Wellesley who Napoleon would meet twelve years later as the Duke of Wellington at a place called Waterloo. Wellington in retirement said Assaye was still his toughest fight.

1846- The planet Neptune discovered by Johann Gottleib Gala.

1908- Giants batter Fred Merkle hit the winning run in a pennant game with the Chicago Cubs. But in running the bases he neglected to touch second base so his run was disallowed and the game was declared a tie. They replayed the game the following day and the Cubs won the pennant. Thereafter Merkle's nickname became Bonehead Merkle.

1912- "Colin Collects a Debt" ,Max Sennett's first film comedy featuring the Keystone Kops.

1921- The Band-Aid self adhesive bandage introduced. A scientist at Johnson &Johnson invented it for his wife who kept cutting herself in the kitchen. Supposedly the skin tone color, which doesn't seem to match anybodies skin, was her skin coloring.

1933- At a dedication ceremony Adolf Hitler broke ground for the construction of Germany’s Autobahn system- 1400 miles of modern freeway. One story says Hitler himself conceived the idea since he was a lifelong auto enthusiast. But that is untrue. German designers as early as 1913 were inventing the road features common to today’s motorists- the Blending Lane and Clover Leaf, Fast Lanes and meridian divided roads.

1939- At the World’s Fair in New York a time capsule was buried not to be opened until the year 6939. It contains a Bible, a mail order catalog and newsreels of President Franklin Roosevelt.

1939- Sigmund Freud died at age 83. Suffering from inoperable cancer of the jaw, he had his doctor euthanize him with a lethal shot of cocaine.

1942- Erwin Rommel the Desert Fox left his his Afrika Korps at El Alamein and flew home to Germany to be treated for acute diphtheria. He missed most of the battle, but returned when things were going badly.

1942-Dr. Robert Oppenheimer and General Leslie Grove start the "Manhattan Project", the building of a "cosmic-super bomb" (the A-Bomb). Hungarian Professor Leo Szilard had been pestering the U.S. government since 1938 to do something before the Hitler made one first. Finally the War Dept. gave the go ahead to collect the finest physicists in the free world to create a super bomb. Scientists like Richard Fenyman and Enrico Ferme would arrive for work at an office in downtown Santa Fe and be immediately whisked out the back in a sealed truck to the top secret lab complex at Los Alamos. General Groves had just completed overseeing the construction of the Pentagon building in Washington. The project was so secret that they were warned if they breathed a word about it the government would make sure they "disappeared' for at least ten years ! Vice President Truman had no idea of the project until he was told the night Roosevelt died. Leo Szilard was never asked to join the team because the F.B.I. considered him 'politically suspect', yet we now know at least two scientists were Soviet spies, Dr. Karl Fuchs and Ted Hall.

1952- The "CHECKERS" SPEECH- Young Senator Richard Nixon saved his career as Eisenhower's running mate by going on nationwide T.V. and explaining away allegations of accepting improper gifts while a congressman. Included is a dog "checkers" for his kids. "He’s a good dog, and we’re gonna keep him.""My wife doesn't own a mink coat, she has a good Republican cloth-coat." Eisenhower was close to dumping the embattled senator from the ticket but the popular outcry of support after this speech but Nixon back on top. In effect he four-walled Ike into keeping him on the ticket.

1962- H& B's show The Jetsons' premiered. It was the first ABC show to be presented in color. Jane! Stop this Crazy Thing! Jane!

1964- Marc Chagalls’ paintings on the ceiling of the Paris Opera House unveiled.

1969- the film "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" premiered. Written by William Goldman and directed by George Roy Hill. It made fortunes for stars Paul Newman and Robert Redford, who later started and independent film festival called Sundance.

1984-Michael Eisner, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Frank Wells met the Disney Animation Dept. and are pitched storyboards for the film Basil of Baker Street, later called the Great Mouse Detective. Eisner dictates memos to start the television animation division. Up to now their thinking had been to dismantle the animation department and earn income from the licensees of the existing library. Roy Disney was instrumental in insisting the animation division remain.
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Yesterday’s Question: Greek-American actor Telley Savalas 1922-1994( Kojak) had a granddaughter that is pretty famous today. Who is she?

Answer: Jennifer Aniston.


September 22nd, 2010 weds
September 22nd, 2010

Question: Greek-American actor Telley Savalas 1922-1994 (Kojak) had a granddaughter that is pretty famous today. Who is she?

Answer to yesterday’s question below: If you have verisimilitude, should you see a doctor?
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history for 9/22/2010
Birthdays: Anne of Cleves 1515- Henry VIII’s fourth wife. Bilbo Baggins and Frodo Baggins, Mafioso Joe Valachi, Michael Farraday, Meryl Streep, John Houseman, Joanie Jett, Erich Von Stronheim, Tom Lasorda, Paul Muni, Debbie Boone, Scott Baio, John Woo is 62

480 BC. Themistocles and the Athenian fleet of 300 faced the 1,200 warships of Xerxes the Great King of Persia in the Bay of Salamis. This night at a war council the Greek admirals voted not to try to fight such mighty host but withdraw. Themistocles finding himself outvoted was so confident in their ability to win that he took a risk that could have cost his life. He sent a spy to Xerxes to tell him the Greeks were planning to flee so he should maneuver his fleet around them and cut off any hope of retreat. Xerxes fell for it and forced the engagement. The victory of Salamis assured the Golden Age of Athens.

287 AD.-THE THEBAN LEGION-One of the celebrated myths of the Middle Ages. A Roman general Maximian Herculius recruited an entire army unit from Christians in upper Egypt. In Gaul with the imperial army the Emperor Maximian orders sacrifices to the gods for victory. The Theban Legion refused to a man to participate in the pagan rituals. The emperor had every tenth man executed (to "decimate") and still they refused. Soon all 1,500 were executed. So much time and money was invested by the state in the training of veteran soldiers that it is unlikely that the practical Romans would massacre an entire legion, still, it's a good story.

1692- Seven witches hanged in Salem, Mass. When the daughter of the Royal Governor of the Massachusetts Colony was accused the Governor finally stepped in and stopped the madness. He overturned the decisions of the Salem court and ordered it's disbandment. These were the last witch executions in America.

1761- King George III’s coronation in London. Unlike his two George forebears who clung to their German Hanoverian roots, George III spoke English without an accent. All the great men of the day were there like Pitt the Elder, Edmund Burke and Dr. Samuel Johnson. In the crowd in front of Westminister Abbey, dazzled by all the pomp and circumstance, was a young colonist from America named John Hancock. Presented at court, he received from his sovereign’s hands a silver snuffbox. Ironically this was the very same Hancock whose bold signature would one day adorn the U.S. Declaration of Independence.

1776- Nathan Hale is hanged as a spy by the British in occupied New York City. The Connecticut schoolteacher had only been a spy for nine days until he was sniffed out and exposed by Colonel Robert Rogers, the French and Indian War hero who was now a Tory Loyalist. One account later by a English officer named Montrose was that Hale’s last words were a quote from Addison’s play Cato :”I regret that I have but one life to give for my country….”

1777- General John Burgoyne was considering falling back with his British army to Canada after being stopped at Saratoga New York. But this day he changed his mind after getting a message from General Henry Clinton who said he was marching north from New York City to rescue. Clinton didn’t get much further than White Plains, and the delay proved fatal to “Gentleman Johnny” Burgoyne and his army.

1792- The French Revolutionaries declare the Kingdom of France a Republic. 1828- SHAKA ZULU , The "Black Napoleon" assassinated. Shaka took the Zulu tribe from obscurity and created the largest centralized empire in sub-Saharan Africa. He created military units, tactics and societal structures that enabled the Zulu to take on the Boers and later the British Empire. In his old age Shaka's rule became increasingly harsh and arbitrary, so his brother Mbulazi killed him. Shaka's descendants run the Inkatha Freedom Party in South Africa today.

1910- 15 year old button sewer Bessie Abramowitz led the Great Chicago Garment Workers Strike.

1925- Lon Chaney’s horror classic film the Phantom of the Opera premiered.

1927- The Dempsey-Tunney championship fight. Tunney wins in the famous 'long count', meaning the referee delayed the count because Dempsey wouldn’t return to his neutral corner. The extra time allowed Tunney to recover his wits and continue the fight to victory. Jack Dempsey was world heavyweight champion for ten years but retired a year later.

1947- A C-54 Skymaster flies over the Atlantic using the first automatic pilot control.

1964-Jerome Robbins’ “The Fiddler on the Roof “ opened on Broadway. In 1953 Robbins had named names to the MacCarthy HUAC committee to save his career. Now in Fiddler he had to use blacklisted actors like Zero Mostel and Beatrice Arthur who despised him.

1967- Farewell voyage of the Queen Mary, in service since 1936.

1975- A emotionally unstable FBI worker named Sarah Jane Moore tried to assassinate President Gerald Ford in front of the Saint Francis Hotel in San Francisco. Her gun arm was deflected at the last second by a man named Bill Sipple. In the subsequent media attention Sipple was outed as a gay man and his career was damaged. “I can’t see what my sexual orientation had to do with saving the President’s life!”

1976- TV show Charlie’s Angels premiered. It made a star out of Farrah Fawcett.

1979-Hanna Barbera's Super Globetrotter's Show, featuring Multi-Man, Sphere Man, Gizmo-Man,Spaghetti-Man and Fluid-Man.

1980- Proctor & Gamble announced a recall of millions of tampons following several deaths from a rare infection called Toxic Shock Syndrome.

1984- Michael Eisner named CEO of the Walt Disney Corporation.
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yesterday’s question: : If you have verisimilitude, should you see a doctor?

Answer: It means having the quality of seeming to be true, without having any proof. A root is the Latin verism, meaning truthfulness.


September 21st, 2010
September 21st, 2010

Question: If your ideas have verisimilitude, should you see a doctor?

Yesterday’s Question Answered below: What is an oligarchy?
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History for 9/21/2010
Birthdays: Louis Joliet of the explorers Marquette & Joliet, Chuck Jones, Gustav Holst, H.G. Wells, Stephen King,, Cecil Fielder, Rob Morrow, Larry Hagman, Ricky Lake, Fanny Flagg, Ethan Coen of the Coen Brothers is 53, Leonard Cohen not one of the Coen Brothers, Faith Hill, Jerry Bruckheimer, Nicole Richie is 29, Bill Murray is 60

454 A.D.- Aetius, a Romanized Vandal who as commander of the decaying Roman Empire's legions had defeated Attila the Hun, is assassinated by his boss Emperor Valentinian III. Valentinian couldn't think of a way to get Aetius alone so he just stabbed him in the neck himself right in front of the horrified court. Aetius's family got their revenge and assassinated Valentinian later.

1327- This day King Edward II was murdered in Berkeley Castle. They shoved a red hot spear up his rectum, so it would leave no outside marks. Edward II was overthrown by his own Queen Isabella the She Wolf of France and her boyfriend Roger Mortimer. Edwards only son Edward III later killed everyone involved.

1589- During the French Religious Wars, King Henry IV defeated a large Catholic League army at the castle of Arques. He wrote a friend later:” Go hang yourself my brave Creon, we were at Arques and you weren’t!”

1745- Battle of Prestonpans- Bonnie Prince Charlie’s Scots defeated the first small English force sent against him and returned to Edinburgh in triumph. The English in London were alarmed but at this time a new patriotic song had been written for King George II, it was called GOD SAVE THE KING, the first true national anthem. Later American rebels would rewrite new words and make it the hymn “Let Freedom Ring”.

1769- MAYER ROTHSCHILD, a dealer in antique coins and furniture in the ghetto of Frankfurt, set up his first bank. He was soon managing the Elector of Hesse's income from selling mercenary soldiers, the Hessians, to Britain to fight the American Revolution. Mayer and his sons built the Rothschild financial empire. Rothschild banks lent the British Empire the money to buy the Suez Canal project from the Khedive of Egypt, they built the first European railroads, and you all know the reputation of wines like Chateau Mouton Rothschild, named for the street Louis Rothschild's house was on, the Rue Mouton.

A Rothschild was the first Jewish person in the English House of Lords, and even German chancellor Otto Von Bismarck set a kosher dinner table while courting a Rothschild bank loan. Every baby in the family is born worth $62 million dollars, then it's uphill from there.

1776- A fire broke out in war devastated New York City, now occupied by British troops. The fire started near Whitehall Street and burned down most of the city, including the spire of Trinity Church at the foot of Wall St. 1793- The French Revolutionary Government throws out the calendar and makes a new one. So today was the FIRST DAY OF THE FIRST DECADE (week) OF THE FIRST MONTH OF YEAR II OF THE REPUBLIC ! If you didn't get it you were guillotined.

1809- Two senior members of the British government, Whig leader Sir George Canning and Tory Foreign Secretary Viscount Castlereagh got so mad at each other that they fight a duel with pistols on Putney Heath (southwest suburb of London near Wimbledon). Sir George received 'a fine wound in the thigh' and Castlereagh got one of his buttons shot off.

1846- Drygoods dealer Mr. A.J. Stewart opened a store in New York City that was so large he put the various items in their own departments, the Department Store. He also had the first large glass display windows which one writer labeled “A useless extravagance.”

1855- Queen Victoria met nurse Florence Nightingale for the first time. Miss Nightingale never had an official title or rank in the British Government but used her influence and wealth to force major reforms in the way the military treated it’s sick .

1862- King William of Prussia makes a minor junker (nobleman) Otto Von Bismarck premier-president and as well as chief foreign minister. Bismarck goes on to make him first Kaiser of a unified Germany (1871) and that Germany a world power. Bismarck's conservative, militaristic style of politics swung Germany away from development of middleclass representative government and set the stage for the totalitarian regimes in the twentieth century. Bismarck also founded the centralized cradle-to-grave welfare state for the average citizen that the rest of the world envies today.

1897- The famous column by Frank Church in Joseph Pulitzer's New York World first appeared with the answer to 8 year old Virginia O’Hanlon’s question : " ...and yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus..."

1904- Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce died of natural causes at 64 on a reservation in Washington State. Others say he died of a broken heart.

1915- The British archaeological treasure Stonehenge was sold at auction to a Mr Chubb, who promptly donated it to the British nation. 1917-The Gulf Between, the first film shot in Technicolor.

1920- The Kimberly Clark Company introduces Kotex ladies napkins in a hospital-blue box. Before that women had to wear something like a linen diaper that they washed and re-used.

1938- This day the Long Island Express- A force 3 Hurricane slammed into New England killing 600. The Boston area was hit with 120 mile an hour winds and downtown Providence was flooded under 13 feet of water. Hurricanes and Typhoons didn't start to get proper names until the 1960s.

1942- The first B-29 Superfortress bomber flew in a test flight in Seattle. 1944- An internal FBI memo concludes "Communist infiltration of the Hollywood Guilds and unions and the only organization that could stop them was the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals" a conservative publicity group that included Walt Disney, John Wayne and Gary Cooper.

1945- Disney short "Hockey Homicide" the first Sport-Goofy directed by Jack Kinney.

1948- the first Texaco Star Theater television show featuring a minor nightclub comedian named Milton Berle. Berle’s antics make him a major star and with Arthur Godfrey’s show help grow television from a scientific curiosity to the entertainment every household had to have. For ten years the U.S. public never missed Uncle Miltie on t.v.

1950- General MacArthur’s UN Army fought their way into North Korean occupied Seoul. On a hilltop the First Marines Div raised a US flag on a loose drainpipe found near a local school. This caused one regular Army commander to complain: “Ever since Iwo Jima the Marines never pass up an opportunity to be photographed raising a flag over something!”

1954- The USS Nautilus, the first nuclear powered submarine, was launched in Groton Conn.

1957- General Rudolph Ivanovich Abel, the KGB's top spy in the U.S. for ten years, was arrested in New York. Abel was a master at devising ingenious ways to conceal microfilm, using secret spaces in rusty bolts, shaving brushes and fountain pens. Abel served four years in prison but in 1962 was exchanged for downed U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers.

1957- The Perry Mason tv show with Raymond Burr premiered.

1961- The Washington Senators baseball club played it’s last game before moving to Texas. They lost. The US capitol would not have a hometown team again until 2005.

1970-first ABC Monday Night Football - Cleveland Browns defeated the NY Jets led by Broadway Joe Namath, 24-21. Announcers- Keith Jackson, Howard Cosell and retired Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dandy Don Meredith.

1970- 20 year old Bill Murray was arrested at O’Hare Airport for flying with a pound of pot. Kicked out of college, he soon found a home at Chicago’s Second City Improv.

1981- President Ronald Reagan appointed Judge Sandra Day O’Connor to be the first woman to sit on the Supreme Court.

1985- “Money for Nothing” by Dire Straights hit #1 in the Billboard charts. Writer Mark Knopfler was inspired by a workman in an electronics store making fun of celebrities on MTV and wrote the conversation down.

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Question: What is an oligarchy?

Answer: A small group of people who control a country or organization, chiefly for their own selfish purposes.


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