It sure as hell ought to be a national holiday. Not only the debut of “Rhapsody in Blue” (1924), Abraham Lincoln (1809) and Charles Darwin (1809), but it’s the birthday of Bill Russell for heaven’s sake! And Alice Roosevelt! And Omar Bradley!
[Note, I used “heaven” and “hell” in the same short paragraph. And some of you think I am not religious.]
Bill Russell - Sportsman of the Year - December 23, 1968
Bill Russell is 80. Back-to-back NCAA championships at the University of San Francisco, 1955-1956 — 55 consecutive wins. Eleven NBA championships with the Celtics in 13 years, 1957-1969 — Russell was the only player there for all 11. Simply the greatest winner in basketball history. (And the best laugh.)
Today is also the birthday
… of Joe Garagiola, 88.
… of author Judy Blume. She was born Judith Sussman 76 years ago today.
Ray Manzarek died last May; he would have been 75 today.
The Doors formed in the summer of 1965 around Morrison and Manzarek, who’d met at UCLA’s film school. A year later the group signed with Elektra Records, recording six landmark studio LPs and a live album for the label. They achieved popular success and critical acclaim for their 1967 debut, The Doors (which included their eleven-minute epic “The End” and “Light My Fire,” a Number One hit at the height of the Summer of Love), and all the other albums that followed.
Lorne Greene (aka Ben Cartwright) was born on this date in 1915.
One of four appearances of John L. Lewis on the cover of Time, this from December 1946.
John L. Lewis was born on February 12, 1880. Lewis was president of the United Mine Workers (UMW), 1920-1960. In the 1930s, with others, he formed the Congress of Industrial Organizations. The CIO lead the unionization of steel, rubber, auto, glass, electrical equipment and meat industries. He withdrew the UMW from the CIO however, supported Wilkie against FDR in 1940, and took his miners out on strike during World War II. He remained popular with miners, of course, but his reputation and that of organized labor suffered. Even so, Lewis was awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1964.
Alice Roosevelt Longworth, Teddy Roosevelt’s daughter and Speaker of the House Nicholas Longworth’s wife, was born on February 12th in 1884. Ms. Longworth was prominent in Washington until her death in 1980. This despite the fact — or maybe because of it — that her only child was not with her husband, but a result of her affair with Senator William Borah. Embroidered on her sofa pillow was “If you haven’t got anything good to say about anybody, come sit next to me.”
Omar Bradley, the G.I General, was born on this date in 1893.
General Omar Bradley - Time - December 4, 1944
Except for his original division assignments, Bradley won his wartime advancement on the battlefield, commanding American soldiers in North Africa, Sicily, across the Normandy beaches, and into Germany itself. His understated personal style of command left newsmen with little to write about, especially when they compared him to the more flamboyant among the Allied commanders, but his reputation as a fighter was secure among his peers and particularly with General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Supreme Commander, who considered him indispensable.
Self-effacing and quiet, Bradley showed a concern for the men he led that gave him the reputation as the “soldier’s general.” That same concern made him the ideal choice in 1945 to reinvigorate the Veterans Administration and prepare it to meet the needs of millions of demobilized servicemen. After he left active duty, both political and military leaders continued to seek Bradley’s advice. Perhaps more importantly, he remained in close touch with the Army and served its succeeding generations as the ideal model of a professional soldier.
And it’s the birthday of artist Thomas Moran, born on this date in 1837. The National Gallery of Art has an outstanding online exhibit on Moran. Click the image for a larger replica of his classic painting “Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone.”
With the headline Death Of Fred Douglass, The New York Times reported his death in 1895. It’s a fascinating contemporary article. An excerpt:
Frederick Douglass has been often spoken of as the foremost man of the African race in America. Though born and reared in slavery, he managed, through his own perseverance and energy, to win for himself a place that not only made him beloved by all members of his own race in America, but also won for himself the esteem and reverence of all fair-minded persons, both in this country and in Europe.
Mr. Douglass had been for many years a prominent figure in public life. He was of inestimable service to the members of his own race, and rendered distinguished service to his country from time to time in various important offices that he held under the Government.
He became well known, early in his career, as an orator upon subjects relating to slavery. He won renown by his oratorical powers both in the northern part of the United States and in England. He had become known before the civil war also as a journalist. So highly were his opinions valued that he was often consulted by President Lincoln, after the civil war began, upon questions relating to the colored race. He held important offices almost constantly from 1871 until 1891.
Mr. Douglass, perhaps more than any other man of his race, was instrumental in advancing the work of banishing the color line.
Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart was born in Salzburg on this date in 1756. Theophilus—or Gottlieb—or Amadé means “loved by God.” As an adult Mozart signed Wolfgang Amadé Mozart or simply Mozart. In the family he was known as Wolfgangerl or Woferl.
The actor James Cromwell is 74. Cromwell was nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar for Babe. So the pig had the lead role?
Mikhail Baryshnikov is 66.
Chief Justice John Roberts is 59 today.
Cris Collinsworth is 55
Keith Olbermann is 55.
Margo Timmins of the Cowboy Junkies is 53. At 29 People thought she was one of the 50 most beautiful.
Peter Fonda’s daughter — Henry Fonda’s granddaughter — Bridget is 50.
Patton Oswalt is 45.
Oscar-winner Donna Reed was born in Denison, Iowa, on January 27, 1921. She won for a supporting role in From Here to Eternity.
Donna Reed as Alma: I do mean it when I say I need you. ‘Cause I’m lonely. You think I’m lying, don’t you? Montgomery Clift as Robert E. Lee “Prew’ Prewitt: Nobody ever lies about being lonely.
1992 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Elmore James was born on January 27th in 1918.
Bluesman Elmore James was inspired by the local performances of Robert Johnson to take up the guitar. It was, in fact, a number by Johnson (“Dust My Broom”) that became James’ signature song and laid the foundation for his recording career. First cut by James in August 1951, “Dust My Broom” contains the strongest example of his stylistic signature: a swooping, full-octave opening figure on slide guitar. His influence went beyond that one riff, however, as he’s been virtually credited with inventing blues rock by virtue of energizing primal riffs with a raw, driving intensity.
Rickover underwent submarine training between January and June 1930. His service as head of the Electrical Section in the Bureau of Ships during World War II brought him a Legion of Merit and gave him experience in directing large development programs, choosing talented technical people, and working closely with private industry.
Assigned to the Bureau of Ships in September 1947, Rickover received training in nuclear power at Oak Ridge Tennessee and worked with the bureau to explore the possibility of nuclear ship propulsion.
In February 1949 he received an assignment to the Division of Reactor Development, U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and then assumed control of the Navy’s effort as Director of the Naval Reactors Branch in the Bureau of Ships. This twin role enabled him to lead the effort to develop the world’s first nuclear-powered submarine, USS Nautilus (SSN-571). The latter joined the fleet in January 1955.
Promoted to the rank of Vice Admiral by 1958, Rickover exerted tremendous personal influence over the nuclear Navy in both an engineering and cultural sense. His views touched matters of design, propulsion, education, personnel, and professional standards. In every sense, he played the role of father to the nuclear fleet, its officers, and its men.
After sixty-four years of service, Rickover retired from the Navy as a full admiral on 19 January 1982.
… Then he met Oscar Hammerstein II, who became a lifelong friend, and the two collaborated on Show Boat in 1927. This musical gave us the songs “Ol’ Man River” and “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man.” In 1933, Kern and Hammerstein produced Roberta, which included the famous song “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes.”
Kern moved to Hollywood in 1935, and he enjoyed success there. He wrote “The Way You Look Tonight” for the movie Swing Time, and the song won an Academy Award. In 1941, Kern and Hammerstein wrote “The Last Time I Saw Paris” because Paris had just been occupied by Nazi Germany, and that song also won an Academy Award.
Billings Learned Hand was born on this date in 1872.
Learned Hand served as a federal judge longer than any other man—52 years. His opinions were prodigious, totaled more than 2,000, covering every phase of the law from maritime liens to complicated antitrust cases. His tart observations (“Judges can be damned fools like anybody else”) were treasured. On the bench. Judge Hand was a formidable figure, a stocky man with the broad shoulders of his Kentish forebears, glittering eyes under dense brows, and craggy features that might have been carved by Gutzon Berglum. Intolerant of lawyers who strayed from the point or became too verbose. Judge Hand sent wayward attorneys scampering back to the facts with an acid query—”May I inquire, sir, what are you trying to tell us?”—or just a furious “Rubbish!”‘ Once, confronting the ferocious old judge at a Yale Law School moot court, a terrified student fainted dead away.
In writing his decisions. Hand followed the meticulous painstaking procedure that he demanded in his court. He invariably wrote three or four drafts of every opinion in longhand on yellow foolscap before the language and reasoning finally satisfied him. His opinions cut to the marrow of the issue and proceeded eloquently but rapidly to the point. Hand’s famed 28-page opinion on United States v. Aluminum Co. of America, in which he ruled that “good” monopolies had no more legality than “bad” monopolies, was distilled from 40,000 pages and four years of testimony, has been a model for every subsequent antitrust suit.
Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albrecht von Preußen was born on this date in 1859. His mother was Victoria, Princess Royal of the United Kingdom, and his father was Prince Frederick Wilhelm of Prussia. He was the first grandchild of Queen Victoria. Wilhelm became King of Prussia and German Emperor in 1888. He abdicated in November 1918, but lived until 1941.
And he would become two-thirds of a tweed-wearing Englishman when he was in England. Then he’d go back to Berlin and he’d become a Prussian prince dressing up in German uniforms – eventually a German emperor, with even more uniforms. He had this really split personality. But the interesting and most important thing for European diplomacy and the future of the continent – which was going to lead up to the First World War – was Wilhelm’s admiration and envy of the British navy. He was from an almost landlocked country, which didn’t have and didn’t need a navy and yet he was taught to love the sea and ships.
“He was a symbol of a political system that was out of control. There was no one authority that actually could operate, even though the law said that he was it. So, when the time came for major decisions to make, you both have a vision that the Kaiser’s hysterical, and that he makes the decisions.
“The answer is probably both, and neither, because the real core of the German Empire is the army and the navy. They run the show before the First World War behind the scenes. They run it during the war from the Front.”
Edward Smith, the captain of the RMS Titanic, was born on this date in 1850. He went down with his ship on April 15, 1912.
Samuel Gompers was born in London in 1850 and came to New York in 1863.
Samuel Gompers was the first and longest-serving president of the American Federation of Labor (AFL); it is to him, as much as to anyone else, that the American labor movement owes its structure and characteristic strategies. Under his leadership, the AFL became the largest and most influential labor federation in the world. It grew from a marginal association of 50,000 in 1886 to an established organization of nearly 3 million in 1924 that had won a permanent place in American society. In a society renowned for its individualism and the power of its employer class, he forged a self-confident workers’ organization dedicated to the principles of solidarity and mutual aid. It was a singular achievement.
. . .
As a local and national labor leader, Gompers sought to build the labor movement into a force powerful enough to transform the economic, social and political status of America’s workers. To do so, he championed three principles. First, he advocated craft or trades unionism, which restricted union membership to wage earners and grouped workers into locals based on their trade or craft identification. This approach contrasted with the effort of many in the Knights of Labor to organize general, community-based organizations open to wage earners as well as others, including employers. It also contrasted sharply with the “one big union” philosophy of the Industrial Workers of the World.
Second, Gompers believed in a pure-and-simple unionism that focused primarily on economic rather than political reform as the best way of securing workers’ rights and welfare. Gompers’s faith in legislative reform was dashed in the 1880s after the New York Supreme Court overturned two laws regulating tenement production of cigars that he had helped pass. Gompers saw that what the state gave, it could also take away. But what workers secured through their own economic power in the marketplace, no one could take away.
Third, when political action was necessary, as Gompers increasingly came to believe in his later years, he urged labor to follow a course of “political nonpartisanship.” He argued that the best way of enhancing the political leverage of labor was to articulate an independent political agenda, seek the endorsement of existing political parties for the agenda and mobilize members to vote for those supporting labor’s agenda.
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson was born January 27, 1832. We know him as Lewis Carroll.
“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat.
“I don’t much care where—” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.
John Chivington was born on this date in 1821.
The hero of Glorietta Pass and the butcher of Sand Creek, John M. Chivington stands out as one of the most controversial figures in the history of the American West.
. . .
When the Civil War broke out, Colorado’s territorial governor, William Gilpin, offered Chivington a commission as a chaplain, but he declined the “praying” commission and asked for a “fighting” position instead. In 1862, Chivington, by that point a Major in the first Colorado Volunteer Regiment, played a critical role in defeating confederate forces at Glorietta Pass in eastern New Mexico, where his troops rapelled down the canyon walls in a surprise attack on the enemy’s supply train. He was widely hailed as a military hero.
. . .
A month later, while addressing a gathering of church deacons, he dismissed the possibility of making a treaty with the Cheyenne: “It simply is not possible for Indians to obey or even understand any treaty. I am fully satisfied, gentlemen, that to kill them is the only way we will ever have peace and quiet in Colorado.”
Several months later, Chivington made good on his genocidal promise. During the early morning hours of November 29, 1864, he led a regiment of Colorado Volunteers to the Cheyenne’s Sand Creek reservation, where a band led by Black Kettle, a well-known “peace” chief, was encamped. Federal army officers had promised Black Kettle safety if he would return to the reservation, and he was in fact flying the American flag and a white flag of truce over his lodge, but Chivington ordered an attack on the unsuspecting village nonetheless. After hours of fighting, the Colorado volunteers had lost only 9 men in the process of murdering between 200 and 400 Cheyenne, most of them women and children. After the slaughter, they scalped and sexually mutilated many of the bodies, later exhibiting their trophies to cheering crowds in Denver.
One of the most important songwriters of the 20th century, Antônio Carlos Brasileiro de Almeida Jobim was born on January 25, 1927. The Brazilian was the primary force behind bossa nova and was especially influential in the U.S., most notably for “The Girl from Ipanema (Garota de Ipanema)” which he composed. Others include “Corcovado” (Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars), “Desafinado” (Slightly Out of Tune) and “Samba de Uma Nota Só” (One Note Samba). Jobim died in 1994.
Pro Football Hall of Fame member Lou Groza was born on January 25, 1924. He played for Ohio State and the Cleveland Browns (1946-1959, 1961-1967). How good was Groza? The award for best college place kicker each years is the Lou Groza Award. Groza died in 2000.
William Earnest “Ernie” Harwell was born 96 years ago today. Harwell broadcast baseball games from 1948-2002, primarily in Detroit (1960-1991, 1993-2002). For decades he was one of the best things about Detroit. Harwell died in 2010. In 1981, Harwell, was recipient of the Baseball Hall of Fame’s Ford C. Frick Award, just the fifth announcer so honored.
Harwell made his major league debut in 1948 after becoming the only broadcaster who ever figured in a baseball trade. Earl Mann, President of the Atlanta Crackers, agreed to let him go to Brooklyn if Branch Rickey would send Montreal catcher Cliff Dapper to Atlanta to manage the club. Harwell also worked for the New York Giants and for the Baltimore Orioles before coming to Detroit in 1960. . . .
Virginia Woolf was born Adeline Virginia Stephen on January 25th in 1882. She married Leonard Woolf in 1912.
I feel certain that I am going mad again. I feel we can’t go through another of those terrible times. And I shan’t recover this time. I begin to hear voices, and I can’t concentrate. So I am doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I don’t think two people could have been happier ’til this terrible disease came. I can’t fight any longer. I know that I am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. And you will I know. You see I can’t even write this properly. I can’t read. What I want to say is I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. I want to say that – everybody knows it. If anybody could have saved me it would have been you. Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. I can’t go on spoiling your life any longer. I don’t think two people could have been happier than we have been. V.
Woolf’s note to her husband just before she drowned herself in 1941.
Charles Curtis was born in Kansas on this date in 1860. Curtis was the 31st vice president of the United States, serving under President Herbert Hoover, 1929-1933. Curtis is the first person with non-European ancestry to ever serve as President or Vice President. His mother was part Kansa or Kaw, Osage and Potawatomi and part French. Curtis had a one-eighth Indian blood quantum.
George Edward Pickett was born on this date in 1825. He was 59th out of 59 in the Class of 1846 class at West Point, but was a hero at the Battle of Chapultepec in September 1847. On July 3, 1863, Maj. Gen. Pickett was one of three Confederate generals under Gen. James Longstreet who led their men against the Union forces on Cemetery Ridge outside Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Pickett’s division suffered over 50% casualties. All three of Pickett’s brigade commanders and all 13 of his regimental commanders were casualties. Pickett himself lived until 1875.
Robert Burns was born on this date 254 years ago.
The wintry west extends his blast,
And hail and rain does blaw;
Or the stormy north sends driving forth
The blinding sleet and snaw:
While, tumbling brown, the burn comes down,
And roars frae bank to brae;
And bird and beast in covert rest,
And pass the heartless day.
“The sweeping blast, the sky o’ercast,”
The joyless winter day
Let others fear, to me more dear
Than all the pride of May:
The tempest’s howl, it soothes my soul,
My griefs it seems to join;
The leafless trees my fancy please,
Their fate resembles mine!
Thou Power Supreme, whose mighty scheme
These woes of mine fulfil,
Here firm I rest; they must be best,
Because they are Thy will!
Then all I want-O do Thou grant
This one request of mine!-
Since to enjoy Thou dost deny,
Assist me to resign.
For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I see the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride
In her sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the side of the sea.
That is the last stanza of “Annabel Lee,” a poem by Edgar Allan Poe, born in Boston 205 years ago today (1809), raised in Richmond, Virginia, by foster parents, the Allans.
… was born in Yorba Linda, California, on this date in 1913.
NewMexiKen was contacted by the staff working with Richard Nixon on his memoirs, RN, many years ago. I was asked to see if I could determine — from among the Nixon papers in my custody — the time of day he was born. As I remember it, my research was inconclusive. Someone else’s must have been helpful. The memoirs begin:
I was born in a house my father built. My birth on the night of January 9, 1913, coincided with a record-breaking cold snap in our town of Yorba Linda, California.
Nixon, by the way, did not use his middle name or initial. Though you always see him referred to as Richard M. Nixon, he himself signed as Richard Nixon and he titled his memoir RN.
George Reeves was born in 1914 on January 5th. He was Miss Scarlett’s beau in Gone with the Wind, but is known now of course for playing Superman on TV 1952-1958. IMDb lists 78 credits. Reeves committed suicide at age 45 (some say he was murdered by his lover’s husband).
Jane Wyman was born on January 5th in 1917. She won the best actress Oscar in 1949 for her performance in Johnny Belinda; she had three other best actress nominations. Ms. Wyman died in 2007. She was married five times to four men (one being Ronald Reagan 1940-1949), but unmarried during the last 42 years of her life. Her real name was Sarah Jane Mayfield; Wyman was her first married name.
Sam Phillips was born near Florence, Alabama, on this date in 1923. He died in 2003.
If Sam Phillips had discovered only Elvis Presley, he would have earned his rightful place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But his Sun Records label was also an early home to Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, Carl Perkins, Howlin’ Wolf and more of rock and roll’s greatest talents. Sun produced more rock and roll records than any other label of its time. They included the songs that served as the foundation for rock and roll, such as Elvis Presley’s first five singles (beginning with “That’s All Right” b/w “Blue Moon of Kentucky” in 1954), Carl Perkins’ “Blue Suede Shoes,” Jerry Lee Lewis’ “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Going On” and Johnny Cash’s “I Walk the Line.”
But there was much, much more: Bill Justis’ aptly titled sax instrumental “Raunchy,” a national Top Three hit; some of Roy Orbison’s earliest recordings, including “Ooby Dooby”; the rockabilly classic “Flying Saucers Rock and Roll,” by Billy Lee Riley; the first pop hit, “Lonely Weekends,” for pianist Charlie Rich; and such high-charting R&B entries as Rufus Thomas’s “Bear Cat.” It is a testimony to Phillips’ ecumenical, color-blind vision of American music that a song like “Breathless,” by Jerry Lee Lewis, could make the Top Ten on the pop, country and R&B charts alike.
At the age of 17, Gillette became a traveling salesman, who made improvement to his wares as well as selling them. By 1890, he had earned four patents. More importantly, he had learned from the President of his company that disposable items made for big sales.
On the road, Gillette used to shave every morning with a Star Safety Razor: that is, a heavy, wedge-shaped blade fitted perpendicularly into its handle. It would have been downright dangerous, in the lavatory of a rumbling train, for Gillette to shave with the type of straight razor used by most men at the time. However, the safety razor did share a major shortcoming with standard razors: the blade had to be sharpened frequently on a leather strop; and even so, the blade eventually became too worn to sharpen.
One morning in 1895, Gillette, now living in Boston, had a revelation: if he could put a sharp edge on a small square of sheet steel, he could market a safety razor blade that could be thrown away when it grew dull, and readily replaced. Gillette visited metallurgists at MIT, who assured him his idea was impossible. It took Gillette six years to find an engineer, William Emery Nickerson (an MIT-trained inventor), who could produce the blade Gillette wanted.
In 1901, Gillette and Nickerson formed the American Safety Razor Company (soon thereafter renamed for Gillette himself). For the first time, razor blades would be sold in multiple packages, with the razor handle a one-time purchase. Production began in 1903; Gillette won a patent for his product the next year.
Stephen Decatur was born in Sinepuxent, Maryland, on January 5th in 1779. He joined the U.S. Navy in 1798.
At the age of 25, Decatur became the most striking figure of the Tripolitan Wars. On February 16, 1804, Decatur led 74 volunteers into Tripoli harbor to burn the captured American frigate Philadelphia. British Admiral Lord Nelson is said to have called the raid “the most bold and daring act of the age.” Raised to the rank of captain, Decatur was the youngest captain in the American navy.
At the outbreak of the War of 1812, Decatur was the commanding officer of the frigate United States, which he had served aboard as a midshipman. As commander of the ship, he defeated and captured the British frigate Macedonian in October 1812. He brought the vessel safely back to the United States. It was the only British ship to be refitted and commissioned in the American navy during the war. Early in 1815 he was commodore of a three-ship squadron, when his flagship, the President, while running the British blockade, struck bottom. The damaged ship was unable to escape the blockading squadron and was captured.
In 1815, Decatur commanded a nine-ship squadron headed for Mediterranean to end the cruising of Algerian corsairs against American shipping. Decatur’s abilities as a negotiator were recognized after he secured a treaty with the Algerians. During celebration of the peace with the North African state, Decatur declared his famous line: “Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be right; but our country right or wrong.”
Decatur was noted not only for his brilliant Navy career, but also for his involvement in duels, which was how men of honor settled disputes in his day. On March 22, 1820, he was killed in a duel with Commodore James Barron. Barron was court-martialed for surrendering his ship to a British man-of-war in 1807. This surrender was one of the major events leading to the War of 1812. When Barron returned to the United States after the war, he had intentions of resuming his naval service but met much criticism, especially from Commodore Decatur. Barron was severely wounded in his leg but fired the shot that ended Decatur’s life.
Zebulon Pike was born in Lamberton, New Jersey, on January 5th in 1779. In 1806-1807:
Zebulon Pike sets out on an expedition to make peace among the Pawnee in Nebraska and explore the headwaters of the Arkansas River. His mission takes him into Colorado, where on Thanksgiving Day he and his party try unsuccessfully to climb the peak that bears his name.
Crossing the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, Zebulon Pike comes to the Rio Grande, which he mistakes for the Red River. Here he builds an outpost and is discovered by a Spanish patrol, which takes him first to Santa Fe, then into Mexico, and finally to the Tejas border near Natchitoches, Louisiana, where he re-enters the United States in June. After reporting on Spanish forces and settlements in the Southwest, Pike publishes an account of his expedition which makes him a national celebrity.
Pikes Peak ranks 32nd among Rocky Mountain summits.
Henry Ford announced a minimum wage of $5 day as part of a larger benefits package on January 5, 1914.
To run the factory continuously instead of only eighteen hours a day, giving employment to several thousand more men by employing three shifts of eight hours each, instead of only two nine-hour shifts, as at present.
To establish a minimum wage scale of $5 per day. Even the boy who sweeps up the floors will get that much.
Before any man in any department of the company who does not seem to be doing good work shall be discharged, an opportunity will be given to him to try to make good in every other department. No man shall be discharged except for proved unfaithfulness or irremediable inefficiency.
And a genius of another kind, Bo Diddley was born on this date in 1928. (He died in 2008.)
Music historian Robert Palmer has described Bo Diddley as “one of the most original and fertile rhythmic intelligences of our time.” He will forever be known as the creator of the “Bo Diddley beat,” one of the cornerstone rhythms of rock and roll. He employed it in his namesake song, “Bo Diddley,” as well as other primal rockers like “Mona.” This distinctive African-based rhythm pattern (which goes bomp bomp bomp bomp-bomp) was picked up from Diddley by other artists and has been a distinctive and recurring element in rock and roll through the decades.
… Jane Austen (1775-1817). Best known for her novels about young women yearning to get married, she was never married.
… George Santayana (1863-1952). “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
… Noel Coward (1899-1973).
… Margaret Mead (1901-1978). “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
… Arthur C. Clarke (1917-2008). Clarke’s laws:
When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
The first point-contact transistor was built 66 years ago today (1947).
Nero, the fifth and final Roman Emperor of the Julian-Claudian dynasty, was born on this date in 37. He was Emperor from 54-68.
Nero was descended from Mark Antony and Octavia Minor on both sides of his family. And one of his great great grandfathers was Augustus (1st Emperor), Octavia’s brother. Nero killed his mother. She, Agrippina, probably had it coming. She was the sister of Caligula (3rd Emperor), wife of Claudius (4th Emperor and her uncle) and mother of Nero (5th Emperor). The mother probably poisoned Claudius, so that her son, Nero, could become Emperor at age 17. (Nero was the adopted son of Claudius, as well as his great nephew.) Agrippina herself was killed (beaten to death by an assasin) in 59. What goes around, comes around.
The verdict on whether Nero set fire to Rome as a large urban renewal project is unclear. He did organize vast relief efforts using his own funds. But he also blamed the Christians for the fire when the populace began to suspect him. Nero did not fiddle while Rome burned. There were no violins (although he did play the lyre).
Nero killed himself at age 30. His inattention to important political matters, his self-indulgence and his gene pool had caught up with him.
John Jay was born this date in 1745. Jay, a delegate from New York, served in the First and Second Continental Congresses. During the War for Independence Jay served as president of the Continental Congress, minister plenipotentiary to Spain, and peace commissioner (in which he negotiated vital treaties with Spain and France). He was Secretary of Foreign Affairs under the Articles of Confederation. During the ratification of the Constitution Jay was author of the Federalist Papers, along with Madison and Hamilton. John Jay was the first Chief Justice of the United States.
Wallach has more than 150 acting credits lidsted on IMDb.
… of Ellen Burstyn. Alice is 81. Ms. Burstyn has been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress five times, winning for Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore in 1975. She was also nominated for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for The Last Picture Show.
… of Johnny Bench. The Hall of Fame catcher is 66.
As one of the most impressive defensive catchers, Johnny Bench was also considered to be an outstanding hitter. A durable catcher, noted for his excellent baseball intelligence, Bench won 10 Gold Glove Awards, two Most Valuable Player Awards and the Rookie of the Year Award during his 17-year National League career. A skilled hitter, the 14-time All-Star selection belted 389 home runs and led the league in RBIs three times as a leader of the Big Red Machine teams of the 1970s.
… of Larry Bird. The Basketball Hall of Famer is 57.
Harry Chapin was born on this date in 1942. He died in 1981. “Cat’s in the Cradle” was his only number one song.
My child arrived just the other day
He came to the world in the usual way
But there were planes to catch and bills to pay
He learned to walk while I was away
And he was talkin’ ‘fore I knew it, and as he grew
He’d say “I’m gonna be like you dad
You know I’m gonna be like you”
And the cat’s in the cradle and the silver spoon
Little boy blue and the man on the moon
When you comin’ home dad?
I don’t know when, but we’ll get together then son
You know we’ll have a good time then
Ted Knight, Ted Baxter of the Mary Tyler Moore Show, was born Tadeusz Wladyslaw Konopka on this date in 1923. He died in 1986. Knight received six Emmy nominations for playing Baxter; two wins.
Richard Warren Sears was born December 7, 1863, in Stewartville, Minnesota. In 1886, seeking to make some extra money, he took a number of watches on consignment and sold them all to fellow railroad stations agents. Within six months he quit the railroad and formed the R.W. Sears Watch Company, a mail-order business. He joined with watch repairman Alvah C. Roebuck the next year. Sears, Roebuck and Co. moved to Chicago in 1893.
Willa Cather was born in Back Creek Valley, Virginia, on this date in 1873. The following is from her New York Times obituary in 1947.
One of the most distinguished of American novelists, Willa Sibert Cather wrote a dozen or more novels that will be long remembered for their exquisite economy and charm of manner. Her talent had its nourishment and inspiration in the American scene, the Middle West in particular, and her sensitive and patient understanding of that section of the country formed the basis of her work.
Much of her writing was conceived in something of an attitude of placid reminiscence. This was notably true of such early novels as “My Antonia” and “O Pioneers!” in which she told with minute detail of homestead life on the slowly conquered prairies.
Perhaps her most famous book was “A Lost Lady,” published in 1923. In it Miss Cather’s talents were said to have reached their full maturity. It is the story of the Middle West in the age of railway-building, of the charming wife of Captain Forrester, a retired contractor, and her hospitable and open-handed household as seen through the eyes of an adoring boy. The climax of the book, with the disintegration of the Forrester household and the slow coarsening of his wife, is considered a masterpiece of vivid, haunting prose.
Another of her famous books is “Death Comes for the Archbishop,” 1927, in which she tells in the form of a chronicle a simple story of two saints of the Southwest. Her novel, “One of Ours,” won the Pulitzer Prize in 1922.
Dave Brubeck died a year ago yesterday. He would have been 93 today.
Today is the birthday of Tom Hulce. The actor who played Mozart in Amadeus was born in Detroit 60 years ago. (The film came out in 1984.) Hulce got an Oscar nomination for that performance. He shows up from time-to-time, but the only other role that comes to mind is as Larry Kroger in Animal House.
Steven Wright is 58 today.
All those who believe in psychokinesis raise my hand.
If at first you don’t succeed, then skydiving definitely isn’t for you.
How do you tell when you’re out of invisible ink?
Boycott shampoo! Demand the REAL poo!
Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.
A lot of people are afraid of heights. Not me, I’m afraid of widths.
A friend of mine once sent me a post card with a picture of the entire planet Earth taken from space. On the back it said, “Wish you were here.”
I bought some batteries, but they weren’t included.
If you shoot at mimes, should you use a silencer?
What’s another word for Thesaurus?
If toast always lands butter-side down, and cats always land on their feet, what happens if you strap toast on the back of a cat and drop it?
Judd Apatow is 46 and has been tweeting about it for hours.
Tony Lazzeri was born on this date in 1903. He once hit for the natural cycle, one of only 14 players to do so. That’s a single, a double, a triple and a home run in that order. (His home run was a grand slam.) Lazzeri was an all-star with the Yankees in the 1920s-1930s.
Agnes Moorehead was born on this date in 1900. She won an Emmy and two Golden Globe awards and had four Academy Award and six Emmy nominations. Ms. Moorehead was in Orson Welles’s War of the Worlds and Citizen Kane (she played Kane’s mother). She earned lasting fame in the Suspense broadcast of “Sorry, Wrong Number,” a stunning performance you must listen to! (Listen with the lights out.) Alas, she is probably most widely know now for playing Samantha’s mother Endora on Bewitched.
And there is this from Wikipedia: “Moorehead appeared in the 1956 movie The Conqueror, which was shot near Saint George, Utah– downwind from the Yucca Flat, Nevada nuclear test site. She was one of over 90 (of 220) cast and crew members–including costars Susan Hayward, John Wayne, and Pedro Armendariz, as well as director-producer Dick Powell–who, over their lifetimes, all developed cancer(s); at least 46 from cast and crew have since died from cancer(s), including all of those named above.”
One of America’s great lyricists, Ira Gershwin was born on this date in 1896.
Summertime
And the livin’ is easy,
Fish are jumpin’
And the cotton is high.
Oh yo’ daddy’s rich
An’ yo’ ma is good lookin’
So hush, little baby,
Don’t you cry.
[with Dubose Heyward]
*****
You’ve made my life so glamorous
You can’t blame me for feeling amorous.
Oh! ‘S wonderful! ‘S marvelous!
That you should care for me!
‘S wonderful! ‘S marvelous!
That you should care for me!
‘S awful nice! ‘S paradise!
‘S what I love to see!
*****
The way you wear your hat,
The way you sip your tea,
The mem’ry of all that —
No, no! They can’t take that away from me!
The way your smile just beams,
The way you sing off key,
The way you haunt my dreams —
No, no! They can’t take that away from me!
Alfred Joyce Kilmer was born on December 6th in 1886. He published his most famous poem in 1914.
I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.
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 81 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 68.
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 64.
Annie LeibovitzIn 1980 Rolling Stone sent Leibovitz to photograph John Lennon and Yoko Ono, who had recently released their album “Double Fantasy.” For the portrait Leibovitz imagined that the two would pose together nude. Lennon disrobed, but Ono refused to take off her pants. Leibovitz “was kinda disappointed,” according to Rolling Stone, and so she told Ono to leave her clothes on. “We took one Polaroid,” said Leibovitz, “and the three of us knew it was profound right away.” The resulting portrait shows Lennon nude and curled around a fully clothed Ono. Several hours later, Lennon was shot dead in front of his apartment. The photograph ran on the cover of the Rolling Stone Lennon commemorative issue. In 2005 the American Society of Magazine Editors named it the best magazine cover from the past 40 years.
Every breath you take
Every move you make
Every bond you break
Every step you take
I’ll be watching you
Every single day
Every word you say
Every game you play
Every night you stay
I’ll be watching you
O can’t you see
You belong to me
How my poor heart aches with every step you take
Lorraine Bracco is 59.
Gillian Welch is 46.
And the great barge sank.
And the Okies fled.
And the great emancipater
took a bullet in the head.
in the head…
took a bullet in the back of the head.
It was not December.
Was not in May.
Was the 14th of April.
That is ruination day.
That’s the day…
The day that is ruination day.
Graham Greene was born on October 2nd in 1904.
He had bipolar disorder, and he once told his wife, Vivien, that it gave him “a character profoundly antagonistic to ordinary domestic life” and that “unfortunately, the disease is also one’s material.” He attempted suicide several times as a teenager. When he was 16, he had a nervous breakdown and became a patient of one of Freud’s students. He fell in love with his therapist’s wife.
He joined the Communist Party in 1925 for six weeks, and the next year he converted to Catholicism so that his girlfriend would marry him. He also converted because, he said, “I had to find a religion … to measure my evil against.” In one of his novels, he wrote: “I believe there’s a God — I believe the whole bag of tricks; there’s nothing I don’t believe; they could subdivide the Trinity into a dozen parts and I’d believe.” He became known as a “Catholic novelist,” though didn’t himself like the label.
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.
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.
James Kenneth McManus was born in Philadelphia on September 24, 1921 (he died in 2008). What in the Wide World of Sports is a-going on here that September 24th, Jim McKay’s birthday, is not a national holday?
And if that wasn’t enough!
James Maury “Jim” Henson was born on September 24th in 1936 (he died in 1990).
It’s the birthday of John Coltrane (1926), Ray Charles (1930) and Bruce Springsteen (1949).
It ought to be a holiday.
Not to mention, four-time Oscar nominee Mickey Rooney is 93, Julio Iglesias is 70, Emmy winner Mary Kay Place is 66, and seven-time Emmy nominee Jason Alexander is 54.
Further, many-time winner of an ALMA Award, Elizabeth Peña is 52. I liked her best in Lone Star.
“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.”
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.
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.
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.
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.
Elsewhere, Betty Joan Perske is 89. 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.
George Chakiris is 79. You know, Bernardo.
Elgin Baylor is 79.
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.
Mickey Rourke is 61. But doesn’t look a day older than 81. Rourke, of course, got his one Oscar nomination for The Wrestler.
Robin Yount is 58.
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.
David Copperfield is 57. If he was truly magic, he’d turn himself into 37.
Jennifer Tilly is 55. 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 45.
Amy Poehler is 42.
Peter Falk and Jack Kelly, the other Maverick, Bart, were both born on this date in 1927. Falk died in 2011, Kelly in 1992.
The immortal Charlie Byrd was born this date in 1925.
… was born on this date in 1863. Was Hearst the model for Charles Foster Kane? Here is what Orson Welles had to say in 1975 (written to promote a book about Hearst and actress Marion Davies).
When Frederick Remington was dispatched to the Cuban front to provide the Hearst newspapers with sketches of our first small step into American imperialism, the noted artist complained by telegram that there wasn’t really enough shooting to keep him busy. “You make the pictures,” Hearst wired back, “I’ll make the war.” This can be recognized not only as the true voice of power but also as a line of dialogue from a movie. In fact, it is the only purely Hearstian element in Citizen Kane.
There are parallels, but these can be just as misleading as comparisons. If San Simeon hadn’t existed, it would have been necessary for the authors of the movie to invent it. Except for the telegram already noted and the crazy art collection (much too good to resist), In Kane everything was invented.
Let the incredulous take note of the facts.
William Randolph Hearst was born rich. He was the pampered son of an adoring mother. That is the decisive fact about him. Charles Foster Kane was born poor and was raised by a bank. There is no room here for details, but the differences between the real man and the character in the film are far greater than those between the shipowner and the newspaper tycoon.
And what of Susan Alexander? What indeed.
It was a real man who built an opera house for the soprano of his choice, and much in the movie was borrowed from that story, but the man was not Hearst. Susan, Kane’s second wife, is not even based on the real-life soprano. Like most fictional characters, Susan’s resemblance to other fictional characters is quite startling. To Marion Davies she bears no resemblance at all.
Kane picked up Susan on a street corner—from nowhere—where the poor girl herself thought she belonged. Marion Davies was no dim shop-girl; she was a famous beauty who had her choice of rich, powerful and attractive beaux before Hearst sent his first bouquet to her stage door. That Susan was Kane’s wife and Marion was Hearst’s mistress is a difference more important than might be guessed in today’s changed climate of opinion. The wife was a puppet and a prisoner; the mistress was never less than a princess. Hearst built more than one castle, and Marion was the hostess in all of them: they were pleasure domes indeed, and the Beautiful People of the day fought for invitations. Xanadu was a lonely fortress, and Susan was quite right to escape from it. The mistress was never one of Hearst’s possessions: he was always her suitor, and she was the precious treasure of his heart for more than thirty years, until his last breath of life. Theirs is truly a love story. Love is not the subject of Citizen Kane.
Susan was forced into a singing career because Kane had been forced out of politics. She was pushed from one public disaster to another by the bitter frustration of the man who believed that because he had married her and raised her up out of obscurity she was his to use as he might will. There is hatred in that.
Hearst put up the money for many of the movies in which Marion Davies was starred and, more importantly, backed her with publicity. But this was less of a favor than might appear. That vast publicity machine was all too visible; and finally, instead of helping, it cast a shadow—a shadow of doubt. Could the star have existed without the machine? The question darkened an otherwise brilliant career.
As one who shares much of the blame for casting another shadow—the shadow of Susan Alexander Kane—I rejoice in this opportunity to record something which today is all but forgotten except for those lucky enough to have seen a few of her pictures: Marion Davies was one of the most delightfully accomplished comediennes in the whole history of the screen. She would have been a star if Hearst had never happened. She was also a delightful and very considerable person.
Today is the birthday of Carol Burnett, 80, and Bobby Rydell, 71.
Duane Eddy was born on this date in 1938, which would make him 75 today. Eddy was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994.
One of the earliest guitar heroes, Duane Eddy put the twang in rock and roll. “Twang” is a reverberating, bass-heavy guitar sound boasted by primitive studio wizardry. Concocted by Eddy and producer Lee Hazlewood in 1957, twang came to represent the sound of revved-up hot rods and an echo of the Wild West on the frontier of rock and roll. Eddy obtained his trademark sound by picking on the low strings of a Chet Atkins-model Gretsch 6120 hollowbody guitar, turning up the tremolo and running the signal through an echo chamber. Behind the mighty sound of twang, Eddy became the most successful instrumentalist in rock history, charting fifteen Top Forty singles in the late Fifties and early Sixties. He has sold more than 100 million records worldwide. No less an authority than John Fogerty has declared, “Duane Eddy was the front guy, the first rock and roll guitar god.” Eddy’s influence is widespread in rock and roll. A twangy guitar drove Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run,” and twang echoes in the work of the Beatles, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Dave Edmunds, Chris Isaak and many more.
“Cannonball,” “Rebel Rouser,” “Forty Miles of Bad Road” and I’m cruising Speedway Boulevard in Tucson all over again. Someone else is driving — I’m not THAT old — but nevertheless, little rock and roll is as evocative as Duane Eddy, dated as it seems now.
Bernard Malamud was born on this date in 1914. Malamud twice won the National Book Award (The Magic Barrel, The Fixer) and the 1967 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (The Fixer). He’s also the author of The Natural.
Gertrude Pridgett was born on this date in 1886. She began performing in 1900, singing and dancing in minstrel shows. In 1902, she married performer William “Pa” Rainey and became known as Ma Rainey.
If Bessie Smith is the acknowledged “Queen of the Blues,” then Gertrude “Ma” Rainey is the undisputed “Mother of the Blues.” As music historian Chris Albertson has written, “If there was another woman who sang the blues before Rainey, nobody remembered hearing her.” Rainey fostered the blues idiom, and she did so by linking the earthy spirit of country blues with the classic style and delivery of Bessie Smith. She often played with such outstanding jazz accompanists as Louis Armstrong and Fletcher Henderson, but she was more at home fronting a jugband or washboard band.
Frederick Law Olmsted was born on this date in 1822. He was America’s foremost landscape architect of the 19th century and the designer of New York’s Central Park.
Ella, Murrow, Albert King, Jerry Leiber, Al Pacino, Talia Shire, Hank Azaria, Renee Zellweger, Tim Duncan — is this not enough for you?
Ella Jane Fitzgerald was born in Newport News, Virginia, on this date in 1917 (she died in 1996). Scott Yanow’s essay for the All Music Guide is first rate. It begins:
“The First Lady of Song,” Ella Fitzgerald was arguably the finest female jazz singer of all time (although some may vote for Sarah Vaughan or Billie Holiday). Blessed with a beautiful voice and a wide range, Fitzgerald could outswing anyone, was a brilliant scat singer, and had near-perfect elocution; one could always understand the words she sang. The one fault was that, since she always sounded so happy to be singing, Fitzgerald did not always dig below the surface of the lyrics she interpreted and she even made a downbeat song such as “Love for Sale” sound joyous. However, when one evaluates her career on a whole, there is simply no one else in her class.
There are many great Fitzgerald albums but an excellent, inexpensive place to start is The Best of the Song Books.
Egbert Roscoe Murrow was born on this date in 1908. He died in 1965.
A Murrow radio report from a bombing raid over Berlin (he made 25 bombing runs):
The clouds were gone and the sticks of incendiaries from the preceding waves made the place look like a badly laid out city with the streetlights on. The small incendiaries were going down like a fistful of white rice thrown on a piece of black velvet. As Jock hauled the Dog up again, I was thrown to the other side of the cockpit, and there below were more incendiaries, glowing white and then turning red. The cookies—the four-thousand-pound high explosives—were bursting below like great sunflowers gone mad. And then, as we started down again, still held in the lights, I remembered the Dog still had one of those cookies and a whole basket of incendiaries in its belly, and the lights still held us. And I was very frightened.
The above from a fine 2006 article by Nicholas Lehmann in The New Yorker.
Albert Nelson was born on this date in 1923 (he died in 1992). We know him as Albert King.
As an electric guitar player who focused more on tone and intensity than flash, Albert King had a tremendous impact on countless rock and roll guitarists, including Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Michael Bloomfield and Stevie Ray Vaughan. King was also one of the first bluesmen who crossed over into the world of soul music, signing with Stax Records and recording such classic songs as “Born Under a Bad Sign” and “Crosscut Saw.”
Jerry Leiber was born 80 years ago today (he died in 2011). Leiber and partner Mike Stoller are in the Rock and Roll and Songwriters halls of fame.
By the time they were 20, in just three years of working together, their early songs had been recorded by a collection of true all-stars in the rhythm and blues genre including Jimmy Witherspoon, Little Esther, Amos Milburn, Charles Brown, Little Willie Littlefield, Bull Moose Jackson, Linda Hopkins, Ray Charles and Willie Mae (Big Mama) Thornton who actually first recorded “Hound Dog” in 1952. Atlantic Records executives, Ahmet Ertegun and Jerry Wexler among them, were impressed, and in 1955 signed Leiber and Stoller to the first independent production deal, forever changing the course of production in the record industry.
For the next decade, well into the late ’60s the hits of Leiber and Stoller were constantly at the top of the charts, including the memorable “Stand By Me,” “Spanish Harlem” and “I (Who Have Nothing),” by Ben E. King; “On Broadway,” “Dance With Me” and “Drip Drop” by The Drifters; LaVern Baker’s “Saved” and Ruth Brown’s “Lucky Lips.”
During this same productive period, there were other Leiber and Stoller smashes, including “Love Potion #9,” by The Clovers, “Only In America” by Jay and The Americans, “I Keep Forgettin,” by Chuck Jackson, Wilbert Harrison’s “Kansas City,” The Drifters’ “There Goes My Baby” and “Fools Fall In Love,” “Black Denim Trousers and Motorcycle Boots” by The Cheers and “Ruby Baby” by Dion DiMucci. [And virtually everything by The Coasters.]
Following the triumph of “Hound Dog,” Elvis Presley actually went on to record more than 20 Leiber and Stoller songs, including such highlights as “Loving You,” “Bossa Nova Baby,” “She’s Not You” and “Santa Claus Is Back In Town.” [And “Jailhouse Rock.”]
Ted Kooser, former poet laureate of the United States (2004–2006), author of many poetry collections, and winner of the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry is 74 today.
Eight-time Oscar nominee Al Pacino is 73. He won for Scent of a Woman, but not for The Godfather or Godfather II. Pacino was nominated for a supporting actor Oscar for the first Godfather, which seems odd until one remembers that Caan and Duvall were also nominated for supporting and Brando won for lead.
Another Godfather cast member, Talia Shire is 67 today. Connie Corleone-Rizzi in the Godfather movies, Miss Shire was Adrian in the Rocky films. She was nominated for the best supporting actress Oscar for Godfather II (1974) and for the best actress Oscar for Rocky (1976). Talia Shire’s actual name is Talia Rose Coppola. She is the sister of director Francis Ford Coppola, which makes her the aunt of Sofia Coppola (daughter of Francis Coppola) and the aunt of Nicolas Cage (son of another Coppola brother).
Agador Spartacus is 49 today. So are Moe Szyslak, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, Chief Wiggum, Professor Frink, Comic Book Guy and Dr. Nick Riviera. All are played by the multi-talented Hank Azaria, who was born on this date in 1964. Agador Spartacus is the Guatemalan houseboy in The Birdcage. Azaria appeared on Friends six times and 13 times on Mad About You.
Renée Zellweger is 44. Twice nominated for best actress, Miss Zellweger won the Oscar for a supporting role in Cold Mountain (without her that film would have died of its own weight). She was born in Katy, Texas, but her parents were born in Switzerland and Norway.
Joe Buck is 44 today.
Earl Hickey’s name isn’t Earl at all; it’s Jason Lee and he’s 43 today.
… was born on this date in 1838. (Click images for larger versions.)
This photo was taken in 2005 from the attic of John Muir’s home, directly above his study, or what he called his “scribble den.” Muir lived in the home in Martinez, California, from 1890 until his death in 1914. Most of his most important work was done while living and working here, though of course he travelled widely.
The service station appears to be a more recent addition to the neighborhood. One imagines that the conservationist would appreciate the convenience of being able to walk across the street for a half-gallon of milk or a Slushee, or to fill up the family SUV. (The photo was taken through a window pane.)
This is the study where John Muir produced some of the classics of American nature writing.
Why should man value himself as more than a small part of the one great unit of creation?
The metal cup on the desk, easily hung on a belt, was a badge of membership in the Sierra Club, which Muir co-founded in 1892. In the bowl on the mantle were balls of dried bread; Muir’s snack food.
I never saw a discontented tree. They grip the ground as though they liked it …
Elizabeth the Second, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and Her other Realms and Territories Queen, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith is 87 today.
Her actual name is Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor. She signs Elizabeth R (R for Regina, Latin for Queen).
