Dear Readers,
Many times I am asked where I get all this trivia from. What book was I getting it out of? The answer is I write all of this myself. I've been collecting data and writing trivia for many years. It's a hobby of mine. When I go through a book or article I find interesting, I keep some dates for my collection. I may be off at times, but that is what makes the hunt all the more interesting. Rest assured, Virginia, while the city sleeps, animation trivia is being written and recorded.

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Birthdays: "God's Imp" King Edward VI- only son of Henry VIII, Emperor Pedro Ist of Brazil 1798, actress Helena Modjeska, Ralph Vaughn-Williams, Alastair Crowley, Luciano Pavarrotti is 72, animator Izzy Klein, Joan Rivers, Dick Gregory, Tony Kubek, Hugh Jackman

1492- COLUMBUS STEPS ASHORE IN AMERICA.- The Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria drop anchor off San Salvador in the Bahamas Oct 22nd Old Style. It was a full moon. Columbus had offered a reward for the first man to see land. Juan de Boromeo aboard the Pinta sighted land first around 2:10AM, but Columbus later claimed he did and kept the money- cheap bugger. Expecting to meet Chinese people Columbus brought with him a translator who could speak Spanish, Portuguese, Greek, Turkish and Hebrew as well as a letter from King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella to the Great Khan of Cathay. Obviously none of this was of much help with the Taino Indians. Although other people have claimed to have discovered the Western Hemisphere earlier: The Chinese, the Vikings or Irish Saint Brendan, Columbus' landing was the beginning of the great European-African Migration to the Western Hemisphere. As Noel Coward put it:" Let’s just say that by 1492 we just couldn't ignore you any longer."

1810- THE FIRST OCKTOBERFEST- Bavarian Crown Prince Ludwig 1st invited the people of Munich to celebrate his marriage to Princess Theresa von Sachsen-Hildeburghausen. Big tables were set up outside the city gates, horse races held and beer flowed freely for days. The custom was too good to do only once so every year the Octoberfest occurs in Therese’s Fields- Thereseweisen, or simply Weis’n. Ein Prozit!

1886- Beginning of Sherlock Holmes story:” Adventure of the Second Stain”.

1928- The Winnie the Pooh stories featuring Tigger are first published

1937- Under pressure from parent Paramount Studio, Max Fleischer signed the first animation union contract and settled the Cartoonist strike begun May 8th. The following year Fleischer tried to escape unions by moving his studio to Right-To-Work State Florida, but the additional expenses and poor box office ruined his studio.

1940-60 year old silent movie star Tom Mix died in auto crash outside of Florence, Arizona. He ignored signs that a bridge was out and fell into a dry gulley. A large overpacked suitcase popped out of his back seat and crushed him. The “Suitcase of Death” is preserved along with Tony the Wonder Horse at the Tom Mix Museum in Oklahoma.

1942- Louis Armstrong married his fourth wife, singer Lucille Watson. She made a home for him in a suburban neighborhood in Queens,New York that Sachmo always returned to after traveling the world.

1960- During a long,loud debate on colonialism, during a speech by the Phillipine Ambassador, Soviet leader Nikita Khruschev got the attention of the U.N. General Assembly by taking off his shoe and banging it on the table. This caused an uproar so uncontrollable that the Secretary General broke his gavel trying to restore order.


1966- Sammy Davis Jr. appeared on the Batman TV Show. Sock-it-to-me!

1971-Weber & Rice’s hippy musical Jesus Christ Superstar opened on Broadway at the Mark Hellinger theater.

1977- Script completed for the classic film comedy Animal House.

1994-Steven Spielberg, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg announce the partnership that would later be named Dreamworks SKG.

1997-53-year old Singer John Denver died when he crashed his ultra-light Long E-Z plane into the ocean near Monterey, California. Later reports showed he was flying inebriated.He had the remains of a sixpack of beer he was drinking by himself. The impact was so great his body had to be identified by fingerprints.

2005- Chinese archaeologists near the Yellow River discover the world’s oldest bowl of noodles. Someone’s fossilized noodle lunch from a bowl tipped over four thousand years ago or 2,000BC.