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June 12, 2008 thurs
June 12th, 2008

Quiz: Who invented television?

Yesterday’s Question Answered Below: Who were the Paladins?
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History for 6/12/2008
Birthdays: Egon Scheile, John Roebling the architect of the Brooklyn Bridge, Uta Hagen, Chick Corea, Jim Nabors, Vic Damone, Irwin Allen, Arthur Fellig-better known as Weegee, Sherry Stringfield, Former President George Herbert Walker Bush or George Ist is 83, if Anne Frank had survived she would be 78 today, my buddy Richard Sherman the composer of the Mary Poppins music is 80 today!

1192- King Richard Lionheart stood on a hilltop overlooking the Holy City of Jerusalem. Lionheart had been campaigning in Palestine for a year. The other Crusader leaders had gone home, leaving him with too weak a force to capture the city. On the hilltop he covered his eyes with his shield and refused to look, saying he could not bear to see the Holy City in chains. Salladin was having problems of his own with unruly vassals and lukewarm support for the Jihad. But when he got the news that the Christians were withdrawing from Jerusalem to the coast. The Third Crusade had spent itself, and Salladin had won.

1733- King Frederick William I had his son Crown Prince Frederick married to Princess Elizabeth Christine of Bavaria. Despite his being gay Frederick the Great did his royal duty and tried to sire some heirs, after which he and his wife kept separate households. Later as King when asked if he ever spoke with the Queen, King Frederick replied:" You see, the problem is, my wife has the intelligence of a duck."

1936- Cooperstown's Baseball Hall of Fame dedicated on the supposed 100th anniversary of Abner Doubleday inventing baseball. We now know that date to be fiction but it was a good party anyway. Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner and Walter Johnson were the first inductees. Doubleday was a Civil War general and the composer of the bugle call "Taps", first called General Doubleday’s Lullaby.

1942- On her birthday Anne Frank was given a diary.

1949- The first LA parking ticket.

1952- Chief auto designer for Chevrolet Maurice Olley completed work on a sports car originally code named the Opel but later released as the 1952 Corvette.

1962-Edward M. Gilbert, the "Boy Wizard of Wall Street," loses $23 million for his firm E.L. Bruce Flooring, then embezzles $2 million more and escaped to Brazil.

1962- In Modesto California a teenage film student named George Lucas was almost killed in a car accident.

1963- Civil Rights leader Medgar Evers was shot and killed by a high powered rifle in front of his home in Jackson, Mississippi. His killer, Klansman Bryan del la Beckwith was not convicted until 1994.

1963- Twentieth Century Fox released the Elizabeth Taylor -Richard Burton epic CLEOPATRA. Costing $44 million,- 285 million in modern money, four times more than the average film – the next most expensive Ben Hur cost $15 million , it remains in comparable dollars the costliest flop in film history. The cast was put up at the swankiest hotels in Rome for months of shooting and La Taylor had to have her chili from Chasens restaurant in Beverly Hills flown in. Director Joe Mankewicz said "Cleopatra was the toughest three pictures I ever made!" Fox had to cut 2,000 jobs and almost went bankrupt. The area of LA known as Century City with its huge shopping mall used to be Fox ‘s backlot before Cleopatra. When Liz Taylor saw the finished film she threw up.
On the plus side Andy Warhol said Cleopatra was the most influential movie of the 1960s because suddenly every woman had to have heavy black eyeliner, light lipstick and Egyptian style straight bobbed hair.

1994- Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend, pizza delivery guy Ron Brown, were savagely murdered with a knife. Nicole’s throat was cut so deeply her head was almost decapitated. Brown was there returning Mrs. Simpson’s glasses from her dinner at the Brentwood restaurant Mezzaluna. The only suspect seems to remain her estranged husband O.J. Simpson, actor, Football of Fame member and Heisman Trophy winner. O.J. Simpson was acquitted in his murder trial but convicted in a wrongful death suit brought by Nicole’s family. Another suspect has never been found.
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Yesterday’s Quiz: Who were the Palladins?

Answer:
The Palladins were the legendary knights of Charlemagne's court, Roland, Oliver
and Ogier the Dane. They were celebrated in Medieval literature as much as the Knights of the Round Table.

Now Baby Boomers: com’on, I’ll bet you remember the 1960’s TV show about the western gunfighter who wore all black and was named Palladin? It was Richard Boone, and the show was Have Gun Will Travel. Palladin’s calling card was a playing card with a knight’s horsehead chess piece on it.


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