October the Second

Mahatma Gandhi was born on October 2nd in 1869. Groucho Marx was born on October 2nd in 1890. Coincidence? I think not.

Maury Wills is 77 today. Wills stole 104 bases in 1962 to break Ty Cobb’s 47-year-old record. So far, that hasn’t been enough to get him into the Hall of Fame.

Don McLean is 64.

A long, long time ago…
I can still remember
How that music used to make me smile.
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could make those people dance
And, maybe, they’d be happy for a while.

But February made me shiver
With every paper I’d deliver.
Bad news on the doorstep;
I couldn’t take one more step.

I can’t remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride,
But something touched me deep inside
The day the music died.

Photographer Annie Leibovitz is 60.

Gordon Sumner is 58. You know? Sting.

You’ll remember me when the west wind moves
Upon the fields of barley
You’ll forget the sun in his jealous sky
As we walk in the fields of gold

So she took her love
For to gaze awhile
Upon the fields of barley
In his arms she fell as her hair came down
Among the fields of gold

Will you stay with me, will you be my love
Among the fields of barley
We’ll forget the sun in his jealous sky
As we lie in the fields of gold

Lorraine Bracco is 55.

Gillian Welch is 42.

Elvis Presley Blues

Ruination Day Pt. 2 [links open iTunes]

Graham Greene was born on October 2nd in 1904.

Graham Greene realized early in his writing career that if he wrote just 500 words a day, he would have written several million words in just a few decades. So he developed a routine of writing for exactly two hours every day, and he was so strict about stopping after exactly two hours that he often stopped writing in the middle of a sentence. And at that pace, he managed to publish 26 novels, as well as numerous short stories, plays, screenplays, memoirs, and travel books. He said, “We are all of us resigned to death: it’s life we aren’t resigned to.”

The Writer’s Almanac (2007)

Bud Abbott was born on this date in 1897. He was the thin one of Abbott and Costello.

The first day of the best month

Miss Bonnie Parker

… is the birthday

… of Bonnie Parker, the Bonnie of Bonnie and Clyde, born on this date in 1910. She died 23 years and 7⅔ months later.

… of Jimmy Carter. The 39th President is 85 today.

… of Tom Bosley. Richie Cunningham’s father is 82.

… of Julie Andrews. Mary Poppins is 74. Ms. Andrews won the Best Actress Oscar for Mary Poppins; she was nominated for The Sound of Music and Victor/Victoria. Of course, her claim to fame really was as Eliza Doolittle in the stage version of My Fair Lady.

… of Rod Carew. The baseball hall of fame player is 64.

Rod Carew lined, chopped and bunted his way to 3,053 career hits. His seven batting titles are surpassed only by Ty Cobb, Tony Gwynn and Honus Wagner, and equaled only by Rogers Hornsby and Stan Musial. He used a variety of relaxed, crouched batting stances to hit over .300 in 15 consecutive seasons with the Twins and Angels, achieving a .328 lifetime average. He was honored as American League Rookie of the Year in 1967, won the league MVP 10 years later and was named to 18 straight All-Star teams. He remains a national hero in Panama.

National Baseball Hall of Fame

… of Tim O’Brien. The novelist is 63. O’Brien is the author of Going After Cacciato, winner of the 1979 National Book Award in fiction, and The Things They Carried, which was named by The New York Times as one of the ten best books of 1990, received the Chicago Tribune Heartland Award in fiction, and was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. In the Lake of the Woods was named by Time as the best novel of 1994. The book also received the James Fenimore Cooper Prize from the Society of American Historians and was selected as one of the ten best books of the year by The New York Times.

… of Randy Quaid, 59.

… of Mark McGwire, 46.

Vladimir Horowitz was born on this date in 1903.

Vladimir Horowitz, the eccentric virtuoso of the piano whose extraordinary personality and skill overwhelmed six decades of concert audiences, died suddenly early yesterday afternoon [November 5, 1989] at his home in Manhattan, apparently of a heart attack. Though standard biographies list his birth date as Oct. 1, 1904, Mr. Horowitz recently celebrated what he called his 86th birthday.

Held in awe by aficionados of the instrument, Mr. Horowitz virtually cornered the market on celebrity among 20th-century pianists. His presence hovered over several generations of pianists who followed him.

The New York Times

The actor Stanley Holloway was born on October 1, 1890. Holloway is known foremost as Alfred P. Doolittle in the stage and film productions of My Fair Lady. He was nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar for the role and he was the only lead actor to do his own singing. This story was found at Wikipedia:

Holloway appeared with Rex Harrison in the stage production of “My Fair Lady”. Harrison had a reputation for being very abrupt with his fans. One night after a performance of the show, Holloway and Harrison left by the stage door. It was late, cold and pouring rain and there was an old woman standing alone outside the door. When she saw Harrison, she asked him for his autograph. He told her to “Sod off”, and she was so enraged at this that she rolled up her program and hit Harrison with it. Holloway congratulated him on not only making theater history, but, for the first time in world history, “the fan has hit the shit.”

The penultimate day of September

Goodness gracious, great balls of fire, Jerry Lee Lewis is 74 today.

Jerry Lee in 2004

Jerry Lee Lewis is the wild man of rock and roll, embodying its most reckless and high-spirited impulses. On such piano-pounding rockers from the late Fifties as “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” and “Great Balls of Fire,” Lewis combined a ferocious, boogie-style instrumental style with rowdy, uninhibited vocals.
. . .

Through a life marked by controversy and personal tragedy, Lewis has remained a defiant and indefatigable figure who refuses to be contained by politesse or pigeonholes. As he declared from the stage of the Grand Ole Opry in 1973, “I am a rock and rollin’, country & western, rhythm & blues singing [expletive deleted]!”

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Ian McShane is 67. Big party at the Gem. (McShane played that c***s**k** Al Swearengen on Deadwood.)

Bryant Gumbel is 61.

Gwen Ifill — interruption here for non sequitur question — is 54.

Gene Autry was born in Tioga, Texas, on this date 102 years ago today. The following is from the biography at the Official Website for Gene Autry:

Discovered by humorist Will Rogers, in 1929 Autry was billed as “Oklahoma’s Yodeling Cowboy” at KVOO in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He gained a popular following, a recording contract with Columbia Records in 1929, and soon after, performed on the “National Barn Dance” for radio station WLS in Chicago. Autry first appeared on screen in 1934 and up to 1953 popularized the musical Western and starred in 93 feature films. In 1940 theater exhibitors of America voted Autry the fourth biggest box office attraction, behind Mickey Rooney, Clark Gable, and Spencer Tracy.

Autry made 635 recordings, including more than 300 songs written or co-written by him. His records sold more than 100 million copies and he has more than a dozen gold and platinum records, including the first record ever certified gold [That Silver-Haired Daddy of Mine]. His Christmas and children’s records Here Comes Santa Claus and Peter Cottontail are among his platinum recordings. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, the second all-time best selling Christmas single, boasts in excess of 30 million in sales.

… Autry’s great love for baseball prompted him to acquire the American League California Angels in 1961. Active in Major League Baseball, Autry held the title of Vice President of the American League until his death [1998].

… Autry is the only entertainer to have five stars on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame, one each for radio, records, movies, television, and live performance including rodeo and theater appearances.

Autry’s Melody Ranch radio show aired from 1940 to 1956. His television program from 1950 through 1955 (91 episodes), and long after in syndication.

Enrico Fermi was born in Rome 108 years ago today.

More than any other man of his time, Enrico Fermi could properly be named “the father of the atomic bomb.”

It was his epoch-making experiments at the University of Rome in 1934 that led directly to the discovery of uranium fission, the basic principle underlying the atomic bomb as well as the atomic power plant. And eight years later, on Dec. 2, 1942, he was the leader of that famous team of scientists who lighted the first atomic fire on earth, on that gloomy squash court underneath the west stands of the University of Chicago’s abandoned football stadium.

That day has been officially recognized as the birthday of the atomic age. Man at last had succeeded in operating an atomic furnace, the energy of which came from the vast cosmic reservoir supplying the sun and the stars with their radiant heat and light–the nucleus of the atoms of which the material universe is constituted.

Enrico Fermi was the chief architect of that atomic furnace, which he named “pile,” but has since become better known as a nuclear reactor, the technical name for an atomic power plant.

Enrico Fermi Dead at 53 — New York Times

And, according to many sources, Miguel de Cervantes may have been born on this date in 1547.

In 2002, one hundred writers polled overwhelmingly chose Don Quixote as the World’s Best Work of Fiction. Votes for Cervantes’ novel came from Salman Rushdie, John le Carré, Milan Kundera, Nadine Gordimer, Carlos Fuentes, and Norman Mailer.

Dostoyevsky wrote in his diary that Don Quixote was “the saddest book ever written … the story of disillusionment.” American novelist William Faulkner reportedly read Don Quixote every year.
. . .

When Edith Grossman published her translation of Don Quixote in October 2003, it was hailed as the “most transparent and least impeded among more than a dozen English translations going back to the 17th century.”

Grossman has translated many living Latin American authors, and has done every one of Gabriel García Márquez’s books since Love in the Time of Cholera. When García Márquez learned that Grossman was translating Cervantes, he joked to her: “I hear you’re two-timing me with Miguel.”

The Writer’s Almanac

September 28th

Actor William Windom is 86. Windom continues his career; IMDb lists nearly 250 credits for him. He was the congressman in The Farmer’s Daughter and Dr. Seth Hazlitt on Murder She Wrote. IMDb says Windom’s kindergarten teacher was Margaret Hamilton.

Comic actor Arnold Stang is 84. Stang was a comic foil — a “second banana” — for Cantor, Benny, Allen, Berle, etc.

Brigitte Bardot is 75.

Ben K. King — “Stand by Me,” “Spanish Harlem” — is 71.

Jeffrey Jones is 63. Ed Rooney, Ferris’s nemesis. And great as A.W. Merrick, the gasbag newspaperman, on Deadwood.

Two-time Oscar nominee for writing, John Sayles is 59. He was nominated for Passion Fish and Lone Star.

Sylvia Kristel, Emmanuelle, is 57. Kristel and Ian MacShane (Deadwood’s Al Swearengen) were a couple once upon a time.

Oscar winner Mira Sorvino is 42. She won the best supporting actress award for Mighty Aphrodite.

The Valley Girl, Moon Unit Zappa is 42.

Oscar nominee Naomi Watts is 41. She was nominated for best actress in a leading role for 21 Grams.

Oscar winner for best actor, Peter Finch was born on this date in 1916. Finch won for Network, the first posthumous winner. Finch was also nominated for the best acting Oscar for Sunday Bloody Sunday.

Three time Oscar nominee for best actor, Marcello Mastroianni was born on this date in 1924. Mastroianni died in 1996.

Ed Sullivan was born on this date in 1901. This from his Times obituary in 1974.

Ed Sullivan, a rock-faced Irishman with a hot temper, painful shyness and a disdain for phonies, had been a successful and well-known part of the Broadway scene since the Twenties.

But writing a gossip column, shuttling about the fringes of the entertainment world and being master of ceremonies for a succession of variety shows never gave him what he wanted most out of life–national recognition.

He didn’t achieve that until he moved into the whirlwind world of television in 1948, and his weekly show became an essential part of Sunday evening for millions of Americans.

Between 45,000,000 and 50,000,000 persons tuned in every week to watch the show–a vaudeville-like parade of top talent that cost $8,000,000 a year to produce and for which Mr. Sullivan received $164,000 a year.

The show was worth every penny of that to its sponsors, Lincoln-Mercury automobile dealers, who made Mr. Sullivan their salesman in chief through numerous trips around the country. And he was the proudest possession of the Columbia Broadcasting System, which found he could outdraw almost any competition from the other networks.

The basis of his appeal was an ephemeral thing that baffled those who tried to analyze it. He was not witty, he had no formal talents, he could not consciously entertain anyone. He was bashful, clumsy, self-conscious, forgetful and tongue-tied. And there were times he was painfully, excruciatingly sentimental.

William S. Paley was born on that same day in 1901. This from The Museum of Broadcast Communications:

Paley’s insights helped to define commercial network operations. At the start of his CBS stewardship, he transformed the network’s financial relationship with its affiliates so that the latter agreed to carry sustaining programs free, receiving network payments only for commercially-supported programs. Paley enjoyed socializing and negotiating with broadcast stars. In the late 1940s, his “talent raids” hired top radio stars (chiefly away from NBC) by offering huge prices for rights to their programs and giving them, in return, lucrative capital gains tax options. The talent pool thus developed helped to boost CBS radio ratings just as network television was beginning. At the same time, he encouraged development of CBS News before and during the war as it developed a stable of stars soon headed by Edward R. Murrow.
. . .

Paley is important for having assembled the brilliant team that built and expanded the CBS “Tiffany Network” image over several decades. For many years he had an innate programming touch which helped keep the network on top in annual ratings wars. He blew hot and cold on network news, helping to found and develop it, but willing to cast much of that work aside to avoid controversy or to increase profits. Like many founders, however, he stayed too long and unwittingly helped weaken his company.

Paley was very active in New York art and social circles throughout his life. He was a key figure in the Museum of Modern Art from its founding in 1929.

It is said Paley kept a pair of shoes in his office desk drawer so he could put his feet up on his desk and the soles had never touched anything but carpet. He was that fastidious.

The cartoonist Al Capp, creator of Li’l Abner, was born 100 years ago today.

Seymour Cray, the developer of the super-computer was born in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, on this date in 1925.

The first Cray-1™ system was installed at Los Alamos National Laboratory in 1976 for $8.8 million. It boasted a world-record speed of 160 million floating-point operations per second (160 megaflops) and an 8 megabyte (1 million word) main memory.

Cray Inc.

Eight whole megabytes of main memory.

Cray died 1996, the result of injuries from a collision on I-25 at North Academy Boulevard near Colorado Springs.

September 27th

It’s the birthday of

… Jayne Meadows, Steve Allen’s widow. She’s 89. It was her sister Audrey Meadows that played Ralph Kramden’s wife Alice on The Jackie Gleason Show.

… Arthur Penn, 87. The director was nominated for three best direction Oscars, but never won. The three were The Miracle Worker, Bonnie and Clyde, and Alice’s Restaurant.

… Wilford Brimley. He’s 75 today. Wilford, you’ve got to cut out the old man commercials. I thought you were at least 10 years older. (Brimley was 53-54 when he played the old guy in Cocoon.)

… Baseball Hall-of-Famer Mike Schmidt. He’s 60. NewMexiKen had to admire Schmidt when, during an interview, he said he “would have” used steroids if they were around when he played — whatever it took. Wrong, but refreshing candor.

… Gwyneth Paltrow. She’s 37.

… Avril Lavigne, 25.

William Conrad, one of the great voices of radio, was born on this date in 1920.

Conrad estimated that he appeared in over 7,500 roles on radio. He was regularly heard inviting listeners to “get away from it all” on CBS’ Escape. Conrad’s other radio credits include appearances on The Damon Runyon Theater, The Lux Radio Theater, Nightbeat, Fibber McGee and Molly and Suspense. For “The Wax Works,” a 1956 episode of Suspense, Conrad demonstrated his versatility by performing all the roles.

Conrad’s longest-running role was that of U.S. marshal Matt Dillon on the groundbreaking radio western Gunsmoke, which aired on CBS radio from 1952 to 1961.

When the golden age of radio was over, Conrad could be heard delivering the urgent narration for Jay Ward’s classic Bullwinkle Show. He later starred on the television series Cannon and Jake and the Fatman.

Radio Hall of Fame

Samuel Adams Beers are named for Sam Adams the brewer of beer and revolution, who was born on this date in 1722.

[Adams] was a failed businessman and a not-very-effective tax collector when the British passed the Sugar Act of 1764, and Adams finally found his purpose in life. He was one of the first members of the colonies to speak out against taxation without representation and one of the first people to argue for the colonies’ independence from Great Britain. He had a genius for agitating people. He organized riots and wrote propaganda, describing the British as murderers and slave drivers. He went on to become one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and participated in the Continental Congress. It was Samuel Adams, who said, “It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people’s minds.”

The Writer’s Almanac (2007)

Johnny Appleseed

Jonathan Chapman, born in Massachusetts on September 26, 1775, came to be known as “Johnny Appleseed.” Chapman earned his nickname because he planted small orchards and individual apple trees across 100,000 square miles of Midwestern wilderness and prairie.
…

Chapman, sometimes referred to as an American St. Francis of Assisi, was an ambulant man. As a member of the first New-Church (Swedenborgian), his work resembled that of a missionary. Each year he traveled hundreds of miles on foot, wearing clothing made from sacks, and carrying a cooking pot which he is said to have worn like a cap. His travels took him through Pennsylvania, Ohio, Kentucky, Illinois and Indiana.

Library of Congress

But here’s what makes Johnny Appleseed interesting:

MICHAEL POLLAN: It turns out Johnny Appleseed, John Chapman, was a real historical figure who played a very important role in the frontier in the Northwest territory. And I also found out that the version of Johnny Appleseed I learned in kindergarten was completely wrong, had been Disney-fied, cleaned up and made very benign. He’s a much more interesting character. The way I figured this out was I learned this one botanical fact about apples, which is, if you plant the seeds of an apple, like a red delicious or a golden delicious, the offspring will look nothing like the parent, will be a completely different variety and will be inedible. You cannot eat apples planted from seeds. They must be grafted, cloned.

GWEN IFILL: And they’re not American fruit.

MICHAEL POLLAN: They’re not, no. I learned it comes from Kazakhstan and has made its way here and changed a lot along the way. And so the fact that Johnny Appleseed was planting apples from seed, which he insisted on– he thought grafting was wicked– meant they were not edible apples, and it meant they were for hard cider because you can use any kind of apple for making cider. Really, what Johnny Appleseed was doing and the reason he was welcome in every cabin in Ohio and Indiana was he was bringing the gift of alcohol to the frontier. He was our American Dionysus.

Online NewsHour interview for Pollan’s Botany of Desire, June 29, 2001

Today is the birthday

… of Barbara Walters. She’s 80. Damn, that’s old enough to be on 60 Minutes.

… of SecDef Robert Gates. He’s 66.

… of Michael Douglas. He’s 65. And of Mrs. Douglas. Catherine Zeta-Jones is 40 today.

… of Cheryl Tiegs. She’s 62.

… Anson Williams of “Happy Days.” He’s 60.

… of Mark Hamill. Luke is 58.

… of Heather Locklear. She’s 48.

… of Scottie Pippen. He’s 44.

… of Will Smith. The Man-in-Black is 41.

… of Matt Hasselbeck, 34. Hasselbeck’s broken rib probably cost me a loss in Fantasy Football last weekend.

The Shakespeare of sportswriters was born on this date 104 years ago. That’s Red Smith. Here he is on the 1951 World Series (after the Giants’ miraculous playoff win to be there):

Magic and sorcery and incantation and spells had taken the Giants to the championship of the National League and put them into the World Series … But you don’t beat the Yankees with a witch’s broomstick. Not the Yankees, when there’s hard money to be won.

And on sports fans:

I’ve always had the notion that people go to spectator sports to have fun and then they grab the paper to read about it and have fun again.

And: “Writing is easy. All you have to do is sit at a typewriter and open a vein.”

William Faulkner was born on this date 112 years ago.

He liked to get up early, eat a breakfast of eggs and broiled steak and lots of coffee, and then take his tobacco and pipe and go to his study. He took off the doorknob and carried it inside with him. There he wrote his novels by hand on large sheets of paper, and then typed them out with two fingers on an old Underwood portable. He was prolific this way — in a four-year span, he published some of his best novels: Sartoris (1929), The Sound and the Fury (1929), As I Lay Dying (1930), Sanctuary (1931), and Light in August (1932). In 1949, he won the Nobel Prize in literature.

The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor (There’s more.)

Shel Silverstein was born on September 25th in 1930. He died in 1999. Glenn Gould was born on September 25th in 1932. He died in 1982.

September 23rd

It’s the birthday of John Coltrane (1926), Ray Charles (1930) and Bruce Springsteen (1949).

It ought to be a damn holiday.

Not to mention, four-time Oscar nominee Mickey Rooney is 89, Julio Iglesias is 66, Emmy winner Mary Kay Place is 62, and seven-time Emmy nominee Jason Alexander is 50.

Further, many-time winner of an ALMA Award, Elizabeth Pena is 48. I liked her best in Lone Star.

And Melanie Oudin is 18.

Trane.

“My music,” John Coltrane said, “is the spiritual expression of what I am — my faith, my knowledge, my being…” The grandson of ministers, he began his career in the blues clubs of Philadelphia, and throughout his career combined the sacred and the secular in the intense, earnest sound of his saxophone. His musical sermons, by turns somber and ecstatic, radiated his undying faith in music’s power to heal.

Coltrane fell under the spell of Charlie Parker at age 18 and dedicated himself to a practice regime that sometimes found him asleep, fingers still ghosting the keys. He first gained fame as a member of Miles Davis’s classic quintet in 1955, worked with Thelonious Monk, then took the lessons he’d learned from those masters and became a leader in his own right — and the most admired, most influential and most adventurous saxophonist of the 1960s.

“There is never any end,” Coltrane said. “There are always new sounds to imagine; new feelings to get at. And always, there is the need to keep purifying these feelings and sounds so that … we can give … the best of what we are.” (Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame)

The Genius.

Many musicians possess elements of genius, but only one — the great Ray Charles — so completely embodies the term that it’s been bestowed upon him as a nickname. Charles displayed his genius by combining elements of gospel and blues into a fervid, exuberant style that would come to be known as soul music. While recording for Atlantic Records during the Fifties, the innovative singer, pianist and bandleader broke down the barriers between sacred and secular music. The gospel sound he’d heard growing up in the church found its way into the music he made as an adult. In his own words, he fostered “a crossover between gospel music and the rhythm patterns of the blues.” But he didn’t stop there: over the decades, elements of country & western and big-band jazz have infused his music as well. He is as complete and well-rounded a musical talent as this century has produced. (Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)

The Boss.

Bruce Springsteen ranks alongside such rock and roll figureheads as Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, the Beatles and Bob Dylan. Just as those artists shaped popular music, Springsteen served as a pivotal figure in its evolution with his rise to prominence in the mid-Seventies. Early on, he was touted as one of several heirs to Bob Dylan’s mantle. All of these would-be “new Dylans”-who also included Loudon Wainwright, John Prine and Elliott Murphy-rose above the hype, but Springsteen soared highest, catapulting himself to fame on the unrestrained energy of his live shows, the evocative power of his songwriting, and the direct connection he forged with his listeners.

Springsteen lifted rock and roll from its early Seventies doldrums, providing continuity and renewal at a point when it was sorely in need of both. During a decade in which disco, glam-rock, heavy-metal and arena-rock provided different forms of escape into fantasy, Springsteen restored a note of urgency and realism to the rock and roll landscape. (Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)

In the day we sweat it out on the streets of a runaway American dream
At night we ride through the mansions of glory in suicide machines
Sprung from cages out on highway 9,
Chrome wheeled, fuel injected,and steppin’ out over the line
Oh-Oh, Baby this town rips the bones from your back
It’s a death trap, it’s a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we’re young
‘Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run

Caesar Augustus, the first Roman Emperor, was born on this date in 63 BCE.

Lewis and Clark arrived back in St. Louis from their saunter to the Pacific on September 23, 1806.

September 22nd

Tommy Lasorda, the former Dodgers manager, is 82 today.

Former University of Arizona basketball coach Lute Olson is 75.

Harry’s daughter Shari is 56 and Pat’s daughter Debby is 53. Belafonte and Boone, respectively.

Joan Jett is 51.

I saw him dancin’ there by the record machine
I knew he must a been about seventeen
The beat was goin’ strong
Playin’ my favorite song
An’ I could tell it wouldn’t be long
Till he was with me, yeah me, singin’

I love rock n’ roll
So put another dime in the jukebox, baby
I love rock n’ roll
So come an’ take your time an’ dance with me

Chachi is 48. That’s Scott Baio.

Ronaldo Luiz Nazario de Lima, the Brazilian football star, is 33.

John Houseman was born on this date in 1902. This from the Times obituary when Houseman died in 1988:

John Houseman, who spent more than half a century in the theater as an influential producer and director but who did not achieve fame until, at the age of 71, he portrayed a crusty law school professor in the film ”The Paper Chase” and its subsequent television series, died of spinal cancer yesterday at his home in Malibu, Calif. He was 86 years old and despite his failing health had been working on various projects until three days ago.

Professor Kingsfield, the role he played in ”The Paper Chase,” led to another well-known part, that of a haughty spokesman for a brokerage house in its television commercials, delivering the lines: ”They make money the old-fashioned way. They earn it.”

Houseman won a supporting actor Oscar for his portrayal of Professor Kingsfield.

Nathan Hale was hanged by the British as a spy on this date in 1776. Hale was in fact spying on the British for General Washington — he had volunteered for the duty.

A statue of Nathan Hale is located between the [CIA] Auditorium and the Original Headquarters Building. Hale was the first American executed for spying for his country. This statue is a copy of the original work created in 1914 for Yale University, Nathan Hale’s alma mater. The Agency’s statue was erected on the grounds in 1973, 200 years after his graduation from Yale.

There is no known portrait of Nathan Hale; this life-size statue portrays what little written description there is of him. The statue captures the spirit of the moment before his execution – a 21-year-old man prepared to meet his death for honor and country, hands and feet bound, face resolute, and his eyes on the horizon. His last words, “I regret that I have but one life to lose for my country,” circle the base around his feet.

He stands vigilant guard on the Agency and is a continuing reminder to its employees of the duties and sacrifices of an intelligence officer.

Central Intelligence Agency

Everybody take the day off

No really, it’s OK. Take the day off. I insist.

If anyone asks, tell them you are celebrating with NewMexiKen’s brother John.

He’s having one of those really, really major birthdays today!

Happy birthday, John. We’ll all be over later with cake and ice cream.

But not candles. The fire danger is too great.

Here’s John, official baby brother of NewMexiKen, on the left, and Lee, aka SnoLepard, official middle brother of NewMexiKen. This was taken a few years ago.

21 September

Larry Hagman, who dreamt of Jeannie before moving to Dallas, is 78 today.

Leonard Cohen is 75.

Bill Murray is 59. Nominated for an Oscar for Lost in Translation, NewMexiKen still thinks Murray’s best effort was as Phil Connors in Groundhog Day.

Faith Hill is 42.

Owen and Andrew Wilson’s brother Luke is 38 today.

September 21st is an important date in fantasy literature. Stephen King is 62 today. He was born on H.G. Wells’ birthday (1866-1946) and on the 10th anniversary of the publication of J.R.R. Tolkein’s The Hobbit (1937). The Writer’s Almanac from American Public Media had a little about each of the three in 2007.

413 years ago today (1596) Spain named Juan de Oñate governor of the colony of New Mexico. 223 years ago today (1784) the nation’s first daily newspaper, the Pennsylvania Packet and Daily Advertiser, began publication. The Library of Congress has a little more about each.

20 September

Anne Meara is 80 today. She’s been married to Jerry Stiller 55 years. Miss Meara was last seen in Sex and the City: The Movie. And Anne Meara is the mom of Amy and Ben Stiller.

Sophia Loren is 75. Miss Loren was nominated twice for the best actress Oscar, winning in 1962 for La ciociara. The film was called Two Women in the U.S.

Hockey hall-of-famer Guy LaFleur is 58.

Rick Nelson’s twin sons Gunnar and Matthew are 42 today. Their dad was 45 when he died in a plane crash.

Author and political activist Upton Sinclair was born on September 20th in 1878.

“The American People will take Socialism, but they won’t take the label.” — Upton Sinclair (1951)

Hey, Good Lookin’

Hiram Williams was born on this date 85 years ago. We know him as Hank. And arguably he is one of the two or three most important individuals in American music history. Hank Williams is an inductee of both the Country Music (the first inductee) and Rock and Roll (its second year) halls of fame.

Entering local talent talent contests soon after moving to Montgomery in 1937, Hank had served a ten-year apprenticeship by the time he scored his first hit, “Move It on Over,” in 1947. He was twenty-three then, and twenty-five when the success of “Lovesick Blues” (a minstrel era song he did not write) earned him an invitation to join the preeminent radio barndance, Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry. His star rose rapidly. He wrote songs compulsively, and his producer/music publisher, Fred Rose, helped him isolate and refine those that held promise. The result was an unbroken string of hits that included “Honky Tonkin’,” “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry,” “Mansion on the Hill,” “Cold, Cold Heart,” “I Can’t Help It (If I’m Still in Love with You),” “Honky Tonk Blues,” “Jambalaya,” “Your Cheatin’ Heart,” and “You Win Again.” He was a recording artist for six years, and, during that time, recorded just 66 songs under his own name (together with a few more as part of a husband-and-wife act, Hank & Audrey, and a more still under his moralistic alter ego, Luke the Drifter). Of the 66 songs recorded under his own name, an astonishing 37 were hits. More than once, he cut three songs that became standards in one afternoon.

American Masters

The words and music of Hank Williams echo across the decades with a timelessness that transcends genre. He brought country music into the modern era, and his influence spilled over into the folk and rock arenas as well. Artists ranging from Gram Parsons and John Fogerty (who recorded an entire album of Williams’ songs after leaving Creedence Clearwater Revival) to the Georgia Satellites and Uncle Tupelo have adapted elements of Williams’ persona, especially the aura of emotional forthrightness and bruised idealism communicated in his songs. Some of Williams’ more upbeat country and blues-flavored numbers, on the other hand, anticipated the playful abandon of rockabilly.

— Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Hank Williams’s legend has long overtaken the rather frail and painfully introverted man who spawned it. Almost singlehandedly, Williams set the agenda for contemporary country songcraft, but his appeal rests as much in the myth that even now surrounds his short life. His is the standard by which success is measured in country music on every level, even self-destruction.

— Country Music Hall of Fame

Again from American Masters:

It all fell apart remarkably quickly. Hank Williams grew disillusioned with success, and the unending travel compounded his back problem. A spinal operation in December 1951 only worsened the condition. Career pressures and almost ceaseless pain led to recurrent bouts of alcoholism. He missed an increasing number of showdates, frustrating those who attempted to manage or help him. His wife, Audrey, ordered him out of their house in January 1952, and he was dismissed from the Grand Ole Opry in August that year for failing to appear on Opry-sponsored showdates. Returning to Shreveport, Louisiana, where he’d been an up-and-coming star in 1948, he took a second wife, Billie Jean Jones, and hired a bogus doctor who compounded his already serious physical problems with potentially lethal drugs.

Hank Williams died in the back seat of his Cadillac. He was found and declared dead on New Year’s Day 1953. He was 29.

Seriously, why do we have holidays for Columbus and Washington, but none for Hank Williams?

Yes, that is June Carter.

Today and tomorrow should both be national holidays

B.B. King is 84 today. Many more B.B. Many more.

King doesn’t play chords or slide; instead, he bends individual strings till the notes seem to cry. His style reflects his upbringing in the Mississippi Delta and coming of age in Memphis. Seminal early influences included such bluesmen as T-Bone Walker (whose “Stormy Monday,” King has said, is “what really started me to play the blues”), Lonnie Johnson, Sonny Boy Williamson and Bukka White. A cousin of King’s, White schooled the fledgling guitarist in the idiom when he moved to Memphis. King also admired jazz guitarists Charlie Christian and Django Reinhart. Horns have played a big part in King’s music, and he’s successfully combined jazz and blues in a big-band context.

“I’ve always felt that there’s nothing wrong with listening to and trying to learn more,” King has said. “You just can’t stay in the same groove all the time.” This willingness to explore and grow explains King’s popularity across five decades in a wide variety of venues, from funky juke joints to posh Las Vegas lounges.

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Elsewhere, Betty Joan Perske is 85. As Lauren Bacall she was nominated for best actress in a supporting role for her performance in The Mirror Has Two Faces. Bacall was 20 when she married Humphrey Bogart (he was 45) and just 32 when he died. She was married to Jason Robards from 1961-1969.

Columbo, Peter Falk, is 82.

George Chakiris is 77. You know, Bernardo.

Elgin Baylor is 75.

Had Elgin Baylor been born 25 years later, his acrobatic moves would have been captured on video, his name emblazoned on sneakers, and his face plastered on cereal boxes. But he played before the days of widespread television exposure, so among the only records of his prowess that remain are the words of those who saw one of the greatest ever to play.

NBA.com

Mickey Rourke is 57. But doesn’t look a day older than 77. Rourke, of course, got his one Oscar nomination this year for The Wrestler.

Robin Yount is 54.

Robin Yount was a productive hitter who excelled in the field at two of baseball’s most challenging positions – shortstop and center field. Playing his entire 20-year career with the Milwaukee Brewers, he collected more hits in the 1980s than any other player and finished with an impressive career total of 3,142. An every day major leaguer at age 18, Yount earned MVP awards at two positions and his 1982 MVP campaign carried the Brewers to the World Series.

National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum

David Copperfield is 53. If he was truly magic, he’d turn himself into 33.

Jennifer Tilly is 51. Tilly received an Oscar nomination as best supporting actress for Bullets Over Broadway. Better yet she was the voice of Celia, Mike’s love interest, in Monsters, Inc.

Marc Anthony is 41.

Amy Poehler is 38.

September 15th

Today is the birthday

… of Jackie Cooper; he’s 87. Cooper’s first appearance in film was in 1929; his last 60 years later. He played Perry White in the Superman films but his real fame was as a child actor, most notably Jim Hawkins in Treasure Island (1934). He was nominated for the best actor Oscar for Skippy in 1931. This is the role where the director got him to cry on camera by telling Jackie (falsely) that his dog had just been run over by a car.

… of baseball hall-of-famer Gaylord Perry, 71.

Gaylord Perry achieved two of pitching’s most magical milestones with 314 wins and 3,534 strikeouts. Distracting and frustrating hitters through an array of rituals on the mound, he was a 20-game winner five times and posted a 3.10 lifetime ERA. With the Giants in 1968, Perry no-hit the Cardinals and starter Bob Gibson. An outstanding competitor, he won Cy Young awards in 1972 with Cleveland and with San Diego in ‘78, becoming the first pitcher to win the award in both leagues.

National Baseball Hall of Fame

… of Jessye Norman, 64 today. From a biographical essay by the Kennedy Center:

Jessye Norman is one of the most celebrated artists of our century. She is also among the most distinguished in a long line of American sopranos who refused to believe in limits, a shining member of an artistic pantheon that has included Rosa Ponselle, Maria Callas, Leontyne Price and now this daughter of Augusta, Georgia. “Pigeonholing,” said Norman, “is only interesting to pigeons.” Norman’s dreams are limitless, and she has turned many of them into realities in a dazzling career that has been one of the most satisfying musical spectacles of our time.

… of Tommy Lee Jones. He’s 63. Jones has been nominated for the Best Supporting Actor twice, winning for The Fugitive, but not for JFK. And he was nominated for best actor for In the Valley of Elah, a fine, fine performance. NewMexiKen like Jones also in The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada. Jones and Harvard roommate Al Gore were the inspiration for Oliver Barrett IV in Erich Segal’s best-seller Love Story.

… of Oliver Stone, also 63. Stone has been nominated for ten Oscars and won three — he won for writing for Midnight Express and for best director for Platoon and Born on the Fourth of July.

Football hall-of-famers Merlin Olsen, 69, and Dan Marino, 48, share this birthday.

County music immortal Roy Acuff was born on this date in 1903.

Roy Claxton Acuff emerged as a star during the early 1940s. He helped intensify the star system at the Grand Ole Opry and remained its leading personality until his death. In so doing, he formed the bridge between country’s rural stringband era and the modern era of star singers backed by fully amplified bands. In addition, he co-founded Acuff-Rose Publications with songwriter Fred Rose, thus laying an important cornerstone of the Nashville music industry. For these and other accomplishments he was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1962 as its first living member.

Country Music Hall of Fame® and Museum

Humorist Robert Benchley was born on this date in 1889. In 2005 The Writer’s Almanac said:

He started writing humor as a kid in school. Assigned to write an essay about how to do something practical, he wrote one called “How to Embalm a Corpse.” When he was assigned to write about the dispute over Newfoundland fishing rights from the point of view of the United States and Canada, he instead chose to write from the point of view of the fish.

He’s the grandfather of Peter Benchley, author of Jaws.

Agatha Christie was born on this date in 1890. Three years ago The Writer’s Almanac has this (and more):

During World War I, she was working as a Red Cross nurse, and she started reading detective novels because, she said, “I found they were excellent to take one’s mind off one’s worries.” She grew frustrated with how easy it was to guess the murderer in most mysteries, and she decided to try to write her own. That book was The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920) about a series of murders at a Red Cross hospital.

Christie’s first few books were moderately successful, and then her novel The Murder of Roger Ackroyd came out in 1926. That same year, Christie fled her own home after a fight with her husband, and she went missing for 10 days. There was a nationwide search, and the press covered the disappearance as though it were a mystery novel come to life, inventing scenarios and speculating on the possible murder suspects, until finally Christie turned up in a hotel, suffering from amnesia. During the period of her disappearance, the reprints of her earlier books sold out of stock and two newspapers began serializing her stories. She became a household name and a best-selling author for the rest of her life.

William Howard Taft, both president and later chief justice of the United States, was born on September 15, 1857:

In 1900, President William McKinely appointed Taft chair of a commission to organize a civilian government in the Philippines which had been ceded to the United States at the close of the Spanish-American War. From 1901 to 1904 Taft served successfully as the first civilian governor of the Philippines. In 1904 Theodore Roosevelt named Taft secretary of war.

After serving nearly two full terms, popular Teddy Roosevelt refused to run in 1908. Instead, he promoted Taft as the next Republican president. With Roosevelt’s help, Taft handily defeated Democrat William Jennings Bryan. Throughout his presidency, Taft contended with dissent from more liberal members of the Republican party, many of whom continued to follow the lead of former President Roosevelt.

Progressive Republicans openly challenged Taft in the Congressional elections of 1910 and in the Republican presidential primaries of 1912. When Taft won the Republican nomination, the Progressives organized a rival party and selected Theodore Roosevelt to run against Taft in the general election. Roosevelt’s Bull Moose candidacy split the Republican vote and helped elect Democrat Woodrow Wilson.

From 1921 until 1930, Taft served his country as chief justice of the Supreme Court. In an effort to make the Court work more efficiently, he advocated passage of the 1925 Judges Act enabling the Supreme Court to give precedence to cases of national importance.

Library of Congress

James Fenimore Cooper was born on September 15th in 1789.

September 14th

Today is the birthday of Margaret Sanger, born on this date in 1879. From her obituary in The New York Times (1966):

As the originator of the phrase “birth control” and its best-known advocate, Margaret Sanger survived Federal indictments, a brief jail term, numerous lawsuits, hundreds of street-corner rallies and raids on her clinics to live to see much of the world accept her view that family planning is a basic human right.

The dynamic, titian-haired woman whose Irish ancestry also endowed her with unfailing charm and persuasive wit was first and foremost a feminist. She sought to create equality between the sexes by freeing women from what she saw as sexual servitude.

Hal Wallis was born on this date in 1899. A producer, Wallis was nominated for the Best Picture Oscar 15 times, winning for Casablanca in 1942. Wallis died in 1986.

The itinerant hall-of-fame basketball coach, Larry Brown, is 69 today.

Joey Heatherton is 65.

Sam Neill was born in Northern Ireland 62 years ago today. Neill has appeared in numerous films, most famously The Hunt for Red October, Jurassic Park and as the ass-of-a-husband in The Piano.

Amy Winehouse is 26. With some rehab, next year on this date she might be 27.

William McKinley died on this date in 1901, seven days after being shot by Leon Czolgosz. Theodore Roosevelt became the 26th President of the United States, and the youngest ever. He was 42 years, 10-1/2 months old.

Black Jack

In all of American history, only two generals have held the rank General of the Armies, George Washington and John J. Pershing. ¹

Pershing was born on this date in 1860. He graduated from West Point, 30th in a class of 77, and was stationed at Fort Bayard, New Mexico Territory (near Silver City), serving with General Miles in the last capture of Geronimo. Then he served in the Dakotas at the time of Wounded Knee. Pershing fought in Cuba during the Spanish-American War, and successfully (from the U.S. standpoint) controlled an insurrection while serving in the Philippines.

Still a captain, Pershing was promoted to Brigadier General by order of President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906. That is, he skipped major, lieutenant colonel and colonel. The fact that Pershing’s father-in-law was a U.S. senator and the president had attended the Pershings’ wedding had no bearing on this, of course.

Pershing’s wife and three daughters were killed in a fire in 1915 at their home at the Presidio in San Francisco while Pershing was commander of the Eighth Brigade there. A son survived.

In 1916-1917 Pershing led 12,000 American troops into Mexico in a failed attempt to capture Pancho Villa after his raid on Columbus, New Mexico.

In 1917, Pershing was named commander of the American Expeditionary Force — ultimately 2-1/2 million men. In his memoirs he wrote that his two biggest problems were keeping the British and French from incorporating the American army into theirs and getting the supplies he needed for such a large force.

Pershing was welcomed home a hero in 1919, became army chief of staff, and retired from active duty in 1924.

He died in 1948.

Pershing was nicknamed “Black Jack” as a result of his time as an officer in the 10th Cavalry, a unit of African-American or “Buffalo” soldiers.

¹Pershing was awarded the rank in 1919 while still in the Army. Washington was promoted to the rank in 1976 as part of the Bicentennial. Grant, Sherman and Sheridan were four star generals of the army. Marshall, MacArthur, Eisenhower, Arnold and Bradley were five star generals of the army. Washington wore three stars, but by law is the highest ranking army officer. Pershing is second; he wore four gold stars.

September 13th

Today is the birthday

… of Milton S. Hershey, born on this date in 1857. Hershey, who only completed the fourth grade, developed a formula for milk chocolate that made what had been a luxury product into the first nationally marketed candy.

… of Sherwood Anderson, born on this date in 1876 in Camden, Ohio.

[Anderson] is best known for his short stories, “brooding Midwest tales” which reveal “their author’s sympathetic insight into the thwarted lives of ordinary people.” Between World War I and World War II, Anderson helped to break down formulaic approaches to writing, influencing a subsequent generation of writers, most notably Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner. Anderson, who lived in New Orleans for a brief time, befriended Faulkner there in 1924 and encouraged him to write about his home county in Mississippi. (Library of Congress)

… of Bill Monroe, born on this date in 1911. The Father of Bluegrass Music was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1970. In 1993, Monroe was a recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, an honor that placed him in the company of Louis Armstrong, Ray Charles and Paul McCartney. Monroe died in 1996.

Monroe is also an inductee of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame:

Musical pioneer Bill Monroe is known as “the father of bluegrass music.” While Monroe would humbly say, “I’m a farmer with a mandolin and a high tenor voice,” he and His Blue Grass Boys essentially created a new musical genre out of the regional stirrings that also led to the birth of such related genres as Western Swing and honky-tonk. From his founding of the original bluegrass band in the Thirties, he refined his craft during six decades of performing. In so doing, he brought a new level of musical sophistication to what had previously been dismissed as “rural music.” Both as ensemble players and as soloists, Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys upped the ante in their chosen genre much the way Duke Ellington’s and Miles Davis’s bands did in jazz. Moreover, the tight, rhythmic drive of Monroe’s string bands helped clear a path for rock and roll in the Fifties. That connection became clear when a reworked song of Monroe’s, “Blue Moon of Kentucky,” became part of rock and roll history as the B side of Elvis Presley’s first single for Sun Records in 1954. Carl Perkins claimed that the first words Presley spoke to him were, “Do you like Bill Monroe?”

… of Mel Torme, born on this date in 1925. The “Velvet Fog” was a wonderful jazz singer, but his greatest legacy is writing “The Christmas Song” — “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…”. Torme died in 1999.

And it’s the anniversary of the inspiration for our most famous song:

As the evening of September 13, 1814, approached, Francis Scott Key, a young lawyer who had come to negotiate the release of an American friend, was detained in Baltimore harbor on board a British vessel. Throughout the night and into the early hours of the next morning, Key watched as the British bombed nearby Fort McHenry with military rockets. As dawn broke, he was amazed to find the Stars and Stripes, tattered but intact, still flying above Fort McHenry.
…

Key’s experience during the bombardment of Fort McHenry inspired him to pen the words to “The Star-Spangled Banner.” He adapted his lyrics to the tune of a popular drinking song, “To Anacreon in Heaven,” and the song soon became the de facto national anthem of the United States of America, though Congress did not officially recognize it as such until 1931.

Library of Congress

 
 
The Smithsonian Institution, which has the original “star-spangled banner,” has details about the flag.
 
 
 

Nine Twelve

George Jones is 78.

In many ways Jones is one of country music’s last vital links to its own rural past—a relic from a long-gone time and place before cable TV and FM rock radio and shopping malls, an era when life still revolved around the Primitive Baptist Church, the honky-tonk down the road, and Saturday nights listening to the Grand Ole Opry on the radio. The fact that Jones himself has changed little over the years, and at times seems to be genuinely bewildered by the immensity of his own talent and the acclaim it has brought him, have merely enhanced his credibility.

Like Hank Williams before him, Jones has emerged—quite unintentionally—as an archetype of an era that most likely will never come around again. He is a singer who has earned his stature the hard way: by living his songs. His humble origins, his painful divorces, his legendary drinking and drugging, and his myriad financial, legal, and emotional problems have, over the years, merely confirmed his sincerity and enhanced his mystique, earning him a cachet that, in country music circles, approaches canonization.

Country Music Hall of Fame

Maria Muldaur is 66. Muldaur, famous for “Midnight at the Oasis,” has an album of Shirley Temple songs (2004).

Joe Pantoliano is 58.

Ruben Studdard is 31.

Yao Ming is 29.

Oscar-winner Jennifer Hudson is 28 today.

Jesse Owens was born on September 12th in 1913. ESPN.com ranked Owens the sixth best athlete of the 20th century:

On May 25 [1935] in Ann Arbor, Mich., Owens couldn’t even bend over to touch his knees. But as the sophomore settled in for his first race, he said the pain “miraculously disappeared.”

3:15 — The “Buckeye Bullet” ran the 100-yard dash in 9.4 seconds to tie the world record.

3:25 — In his only long jump, he leaped 26-8 1/4, a world record that would last 25 years.

3:34 — His 20.3 seconds bettered the world record in the 220-yard dash.

4:00 — With his 22.6 seconds in the 220-yard low hurdles, he became the first person to break 23 seconds in the event.

For most athletes, Jesse Owens’ performance one spring afternoon in 1935 would be the accomplishment of a lifetime. In 45 minutes, he established three world records and tied another.

But that was merely an appetizer for Owens. In one week in the summer of 1936, on the sacred soil of the Fatherland, the master athlete humiliated the master race.

H(enry) L(ouis) Mencken

… essayist and editor, was born on September 12th in 1880. I’ve posted many of these before, but Mencken has some great lines that I never tire of reading:

• The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with…
• It is impossible to imagine Goethe or Beethoven being good at billiards or golf.
• Courtroom—A place where Jesus Christ and Judas Iscariot would be equals, with the betting odds in favor of Judas.
• Injustice is relatively easy to bear; what stings is justice.
• A judge is a law student who marks his own examination papers.
• It is even harder for the average ape to believe that he has descended from man.
• The first kiss is stolen by the man; the last is begged by the woman.
• The only really happy folk are married women and single men.
• It is now quite lawful for a Catholic woman to avoid pregnancy by a resort to mathematics, though she is still forbidden to resort to physics or chemistry.
• Say what you will about the Ten Commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them.
• No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.
• Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.
• I believe in only one thing: liberty; but I do not believe in liberty enough to want to force it upon anyone.
• In this world of sin and sorrow there is always something to be thankful for. As for me, I rejoice that I am not a Republican.

September 11th

Two immortal football coaches share this birthday. Paul “Bear” Bryant was born on this date in 1913. Tom Landry was born on this date in 1924.

Actor Earl Holliman is 81. Holliman is perhaps best know as Lt. Bill Crowley on Police Woman with Angie Dickinson.

Musician Leo Kottke is 64.

One-time Oscar nominee Amy Madigan is 59. She was nominated for Twice in a Lifetime in 1985.

Sportscaster Lesley Visser is 56. Visser was the first woman to receive the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s Pete Rozelle Radio-Television Award.

Oscar nominee for best supporting actress for her performance in Sideways, Virginia Madsen is 48.

Kristy McNichol is 47.

Harry Connick Jr. is 42. He grew up in New Orleans where his father was D.A.

Ludacris is 32.

William Sydney Porter was born on this date in 1852. We know him as O. Henry. According to The Writer’s Almanac last year, “He wrote his most famous story, ‘The Gift of the Magi,’ in three hours, in the middle of the night, with his editor sleeping on his couch.” NewMexiKen had posted that story in its entirety. Another particular favorite is The Ransom of Red Chief.

D. H. Lawrence was born on this date in 1885.

He had an incredibly difficult life. He was a teacher, but he caught tuberculosis as a young man and eventually became too sick to teach. During World War I, the British government suspected he was a German spy, because his wife was German and he opposed the war. Most of all, he struggled against censorship. More than almost any other writer at the time, he believed that in order to write about human experience, novelists had to write explicitly about sex. When he published his first important novel, Sons and Lovers (1913), he found that his editor had deleted numerous erotic passages without his permission. When he published his novel The Rainbow in 1915, Scotland Yard seized most of the printed copies under charges of obscenity. He was blacklisted as an obscene writer and none of the magazines in England would publish anything he wrote. He finished Women in Love in 1916, but couldn’t get it published until 1920, and even then he could only publish it privately.

Lawrence was finally allowed to leave England when World War I was over, and he was so happy that he traveled everywhere, to Ceylon [now Sri Lanka], Australia, Tahiti, Mexico, and New Mexico.

He eventually moved back to Europe and worked on his last big novel, Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1928). It was banned in England and America. One British critic called it “the most evil outpouring that has ever besmirched the literature of our country.” It was not widely available until 1960, when Penguin published an unexpurgated edition.

He said, “Be still when you have nothing to say; when genuine passion moves you, say what you’ve got to say, and say it hot.”

The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor

9-10 a big fat hen

Today is the birthday

… of Arnold Palmer. Arnie is 80 today.

… of Jose Feliciano. He’s 64. Feliciano was one of the first to stylize The Star Spangled Banner, giving it a Latin touch at Tiger Stadium during the 1968 World Series.

… of Basketball Hall of Fame inductee Bob Lanier. He’s 61.

… of Amy Irving. She’s 56. Ms. Irving was nominated for a best supporting actress Oscar for her performance in Yentl.

… of future Baseball Hall of Fame inductee Randy Johnson. He’s 46.

And it’s the birthday of Roger Maris, born on this date in 1934. The following is from The Official Roger Maris Web Site:

Roger and teammate Mickey Mantle entertained baseball fans throughout the summer of ’61 as the two New York Yankee sluggers chased the record many called the most cherished in all of sports. Mickey dropped out of the home run race early due to an illness, but finished with a career high 54 home runs. Roger tied Ruth on September 26, hitting his 60th home run. He then hit his 61st home run on the final day of the season, October 1, 1961, against the Boston Red Sox to set a new record. The Yankees won the game, 1 to 0, and later went on to win the World Series.

Roger was voted the Most Valuable Player in the American league for the second straight year, as he led the league in home runs and RBI’s. He was also named the 1961 Associated Press’ Male Athlete of the Year.

During his career, Roger Maris played in seven World Series and seven All-Star games. He hit 275 career home runs and won the Gold Glove Award for outstanding defensive play. The New York Yankees retired his number “9″ in 1984.

It was on September 10, 1813, that Oliver Hazard Perry sent the message, “We have met the enemy, and they are ours.” The enemy was a British fleet. Perry’s fleet had defeated it in the Battle of Lake Erie.

Nine Nine Nine

Cliff Robertson is 86. Robertson won the best acting Oscar in 1969 for Charly. Most recently he has played Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben.

Joe Theismann is 60. Allegedly his name was pronounced Thees-man until he went to Notre Dame and they realized that Thighs-man rhymed with Heisman (as in the Trophy). No, really. (Theismann was runner-up to Jim Plunkett of Stanford for the Heisman in 1970.) NewMexiKen was at RFK that Monday night in 1985 when Lawrence Taylor broke Theismann’s leg.

Once-upon-a-time child star Angela Cartwright is 57.

Hugh Grant is 49. Is it just me, or do he and Phil Mickelson have the same goofy look?

Adam Sandler turns 43 today.

Best supporting actress nominee for Brokeback Mountain, Michelle Williams is 29.

Otis Redding was born on this date in 1941.

Though his career was relatively brief, cut short by a tragic plane crash, Otis Redding was a singer of such commanding stature that to this day he embodies the essence of soul music in its purist form. His name is synonymous with the term soul, music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm & blues into a form of funky, secular testifying. Redding left behind a legacy of recordings made during the four-year period from his first sessions for Stax/Volt Records in 1963 until his death in 1967. Ironically, although he consistently impacted the R&B charts beginning with the Top Ten appearance of “Mr. Pitiful” in 1965, none of his singles fared better than #21 on the pop Top Forty until the posthumous release of “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay.” That landmark song, recorded just four days before Redding’s death, went to #1 and stayed there for four weeks in early 1968.

— Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Redding wrote the song known as Aretha Franklin’s signature hit, “Respect.”

Try a Little Tenderness

The 248th day of 2009

Jesse James was born on this date in 1847. If James were alive today, he’d be the kind of guy who’d park a Ryder truck in front of a federal building. He was not the Robin Hood character many learned, but rather a racist, anti-emancipation, anti-union murdering terrorist long after the civil war had effectively decided the larger matters. See T.J. Stiles masterful Jesse James: Last Rebel of the Civil War.

“As this patient biography makes clear, violence came to Jesse James more or less with his mother’s milk.” — Larry McMurtry.

“Overall, this is the biography of a violent criminal whose image was promoted and actions extenuated by those who saw him as a useful weapon against black rights and Republican rule.” — Eric Foner

John Cage was born on this date in 1912. On his death in 1992, The New York Times described Cage as a “prolific and influential composer whose Minimalist works have long been a driving force in the world of music, dance and art.” Cage’s most influential and famous piece is 4’33″. It consists of four minutes and 33 seconds of silence. The work was among National Public Radio’s 100 most important American musical works of the 20th century.

The piece, premiered in 1952, directs someone to close the lid of a piano, set a stopwatch, and sit in silence for four minutes and thirty-three seconds. Musicians and critics alike initially thought the piece a joke. But its premiere pianist, who never played a note, calls it his most intense listening experience. “4:33″ speaks to the nature of sound and the musical nature of silence.

Bob Newhart is 80. Raquel Welch is 69. Michael Keaton is 58.

August 17th

Maureen O’Hara is 89 today. Once voted one of the five most beautiful women in the world, Miss O’Hara is proabably best known now as Natalie Wood’s unbelieving mother in the classic Miracle on 34th Street; or perhaps as Esmeralda to Charles Laughton’s Quasimodo in the Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Nobel Prize-winning author V.S. Naipaul is 77.

Robert De Niro is 66 today. De Niro has been nominated for the Best Actor in a Leading Role Oscar five times, winning for Raging Bull in 1981. He also won the Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role as the young Vito Corleone in Godfather II. De Niro’s other nominations were for Taxi Driver, The Deer Hunter, Awakenings and Cape Fear.

Novelist Jonathan Franzen is 50 today. His The Corrections won the 2001 National Book Award.

Oprah chose it for her Book Club, but Franzen made several ambivalent comments about the honor in his interviews. He said, “I see this as my book, my creation, and I didn’t want that logo of corporate ownership on it,” and, “She’s picked some good books, but she’s picked enough schmaltzy, one-dimensional ones that I cringe, myself, even though I think she’s really smart and she’s really fighting the good fight.” Oprah announced that Franzen was “seemingly uncomfortable and conflicted about being chosen as a book club selection,” and for the first time ever, withdrew her invitation to an author to be part of the book club. But The Corrections was still a huge best seller and won the National Book Award.

The Writer’s Almanac

Sean Penn is 49 today. Penn has been nominated for the Best Actor in a Leading Role Oscar five times, winning for Mystic River and Milk. Penn’s other nominations were for Dead Man Walking, Sweet and Lowdown and I Am Sam.

Football coach Jon Gruden is 46.

Davy Crockett — frontiersman, soldier, three-term congressman, restless soul — was born on this day in 1786. He died at the Alamo in on March 6, 1836. Crockett opposed the Indian Removal Act.

After seeing Mae’s jewelry the coat check girl exclaims, “Goodness, what lovely diamonds!” Mae replies, “Goodness had nothing to do with it.” That’s screen legend Mae West in Night After Night. Ms. West was born on this date in 1893.