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interior of the Hollywood Studio Museum, the site of where the first Hollywood movie was made in 1913.

David Folkman, he of Hogans' Alley and the National Cartoonists' Society, sent me over his photos of the recent 2008 Afternoon of Remembrance. It's where the animation community gathers once a year to remember our friends and colleagues who left us in the past year. We had 50 people to honor, from studio heads to trainees, one almost 100, one almost 13. All were our comrades in cartoons, and we will miss them.

Thank You David for the great photos, and to Hollywood Heritage for use of the Hollywood Studio Museum, the site of Cecil B. DeMille's first studio in 1913. The museum is open year round and is a treasure trove of old movie memorabilia. Check out their website in my links.

I just posted a few snaps that are in my Gallery Section. I purposely ommitted many faces, because they did not come to be part of a party, but many to recall their friends in privacy, so I will respect them.


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Question: What is the origin of the word Fake?

Yesterdays’ question answered below: Is the true that the sandwich was invented by a man named Sandwich?
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History for 3/12/2008
Birthdays: Jack Kerouac, Billy "Buckwheat "Thomas, Darryl Strawberry, Edward Albee, Andrew Young, Joan Kennedy, Eugene Ormandy, Gordon McCrae, Liza Minelli is 62, Courtenay Vance, James Taylor, Al Jareau, Maurice Evans, Barbara Feldon- agent 99 in Get Smart, DeWitt Bodeen- writer of the 1942 film Cat People. Porn Star Ron Jeremy is 55.

To the Zoroastrians of Persia this was the Festival of Marduk, the God of Storms.

1507- Caesar Borgia killed. After being run out of Rome after his father Pope Alexander VI 's death, Caesare Borgia became a petty mercenary in Navarre. During a battle he spurs his horse into the thickest of the foe, and on a pre-arranged signal none of his men follow. Doh!

1796- After a two-day honeymoon at her place, Malmaison, Napoleon leaves Josephine
to go conquer Italy. And don't forget to pick up the Sunday paper on the way back!

1877-In Philadelphia, Sam Wanamaker was unsure just what kind of retail he wanted to go into, he just wanted his business to be big. So he opened a large building with different types of goods sold in separate departments. Wanamakers became the first true Department Store.

1928- THE SAN FRANCISQUITO DAM DISASTER- The second worst disaster to hit California after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire. Following up his triumph bringing water to Southern California by aqueduct, William Mulholland had designed several dams and reservoirs north of the city in the Santa Clarita Valley. On this night the largest of them exploded from basic structural weakness and sent a wall of water 30 feet high across the rural towns of Santa Paula and Fillmore down to Oxnard and the Pacific. 400 people drowned in their beds without warning. Mulholland took full responsibility for the disaster and resigned all his city offices. "I envy the dead" , he said. He died a few years later. Today when driving around the Valencia-Newhall area you can still see huge boulders with steel retaining rods sticking out of them. They are not natural rocks but chunks of the dam carried miles by the torrent of water.

1930-Mohandas K Ghandi ,of India, called the Mahatma or the Great Soul, began his Salt March. This gesture of defying the British Empire's monopoly on salt production was a gesture akin to throwing tea into Boston Harbor. He set out from his ashram with 78 followers and a lot of press coverage; by the time he reached the Indian Ocean his followers had become tens of thousands and was famous around the world.

1932-Disney short "Mickey’s Revue" featuring Dippy Dog, now turned into a new character named "the Goof" or Goofy.

1933-THE FIRESIDE CHATS- President Franklin Roosevelt began a series of national radio broadcasts explaining his plans to fight the economic problems of the country. They were called by CBS newsman Robert Trout the Fireside Chats. FDR amazed the American public by speaking quietly and candidly, instead of using the bombastic speeches politicians used at the time.

1945-THE WAR OF HOLLYWOOD BEGAN-Throughout the 1930’s and 40’s several national unions battled studios and each other to represent Hollywood film workers. The Teamsters, the FWPC, the Brotherhood of Electricians. By 1945 only two remained, the IATSE and the CSU.(International Alliance of Theater and Screen Engineers and the Conference of Studio Unions) IATSE had a reputation of gangsterism and making cozy deals with the studio heads. The CSU, a much more militant group with past ties to communist organizations, was headed by a charismatic scenery painter named Herb Sorrell who had helped win the Disney strike for the cartoonists in 1941. Sorrel called several citywide strikes that paralyzed Hollywood in 1945, 46,and 47. President Richard Walsh of IATSE fought them and rioting in front of the studios was commonplace.

1951- Former Disney assistant animator Hank Ketcham was trying his hand as a print cartoonist. He had some success selling gags to the New Yorker Magazine. His baby son Dennis was a precocious infant. One day after smearing the contents of his diaper around the house his mother exclaimed to Hank-“ Your son is a Menace!” That gave Ketcham an idea. Today the first Dennis the Menace comic strip was published.

1955- BIRD DIED- Jazz genius Charlie "Bird" Parker had a lifelong drug addiction. Since the death of his infant daughter earlier that year his drug use had spiraled out of control. He was sleeping on the couch in the NY apartment of the Baroness du Rothschild-Konigswarter, a jazz supporter. He awoke to watch TV.. While laughing at a juggler on the Dorsey Brothers Variety Show he died. The coroner said death was by heart failure, cirrhosis and pneumonia. He estimated Parker’s age at 65. He was really 34. When his band heard of his death they paused between sets to all shoot up with heroin in his honor. "Seems silly now, come to think of it." Said one musician later.

1969- Mrs. Robinson –a song written by two young folk singers named Simon & Garfunkel, won a Grammy award.

1969- Paul and Linda McCartney married.

1992- Warren Beatty married Annette Benning.

2000- Pope John Paul II officially apologized on behalf of the Roman Catholic Church for the Crusades, The Inquisition, 2000 years of Anti-Semitic persecution, the Fires of Smithfield, Bloody Mary, burning at the stake Jan Hus and Giordano Bruno, Silencing Galileo and Copernicus, the Thirty Years War, The forced conversions of indigenous peoples, ignoring the Holocaust, uhh. Did I leave anything out? Comedian John Stewart said Judaism officially apologized for the Barbara Streisand movie "Yentl."

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Yesterdays’ question: Is the true that the sandwich was invented by a man named Sandwich?

Answer: First Lord of the Admiralty John Montague, the 4th Earl of Sandwich 1718-1792, was reputedly so passionate about gambling that he didn’t want to waste time at a sit-down dinner. So he put a slice of meat in between two slices of bread and returned to the card tables. Soon others at these gambling parties would say” Bring me what Sandwich is having”, then simply “bring me a sandwich.”


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