Category: Birthdays

Individuals born on this date with an emphasis on American history and culture, including pop culture.

Two voices you know

Bobbie Hatfield was born on this date in 1940. When Hatfield died in November 2003 NewMexiKen posted this:

The Righteous Brothers — blue-eyed soul. No one believed they were white. The name had something to do with that, but it was the sound that fooled everyone.

Bobby Hatfield had the higher voice; Bill Medley the lower. In the book accompanying the Phil Spector compilation, Back to Mono, songwriter Cynthia Weil recalls that:

After Phil, Barry [co-writer Barry Mann] and I finished the song, we took it over to The Righteous Brothers. Bill Medley, who has the low voice, seemed to like the song. I remember Bobby Hatfield saying, “But what do I do while he’s singing the whole first verse?” and Phil said, “You can go directly to the bank!”

On AM radio in those days deejays didn’t like songs that lasted more than three minutes. Lovin’ Feelin’ is 3:46. On the label Spector printed 3:05. It was number one for two weeks in February 1965.

Veronica Bennett was born on this date in 1943. That’s Ronnie Spector, one-time Mrs. Phil Spector (married 1968-1974), and lead singer of The Ronettes (with her sister and cousin). Hits included Be My Baby and Walkin’ in the Rain.

“I like to look the way Ronnie Spector sounds: sexy, hungry, totally trashy. I admire her tonal quality.” — Madonna, quoted at RonnieSpector.com.

Herbert Clark Hoover

… was born on this date in 1874. Mr. Hoover, who was the 31st President of the United States, lived until 1964. Among the presidents, only Reagan, Ford and the first Adams have lived longer.

Born in Iowa, orphaned at nine, Hoover grew up in Oregon. He was in the first class at Stanford University, graduating as a mining engineer. Hoover earned millions in mining before turning his attention to public service. He was instrumental in relief and humanitarian efforts during and after World War I. He was Secretary of Commerce under Presidents Harding and Coolidge.

Hoover, the Republican, defeated Al Smith, the Democrat, handily in the 1928 election with 58% of the popular vote.

President at the time of the stock market crash and subsequent depression, Hoover believed that, while people should not suffer, assistance should be primarily a local and voluntary responsibility. Even so, he supported some measures to aid businesses and farmers; indeed, among his party he was moderate. But he was simply not bold enough to meet the crisis.

Hoover lost to Franklin Roosevelt in 1932, 57.3% to 39.6% of the popular vote, 472-59 in the electoral vote.

It’s the birthday of

Roger Clemens, 44, baseball pitcher, Cy Young Award, MVP.

Wesley Snipes, 44, actor, Passenger 57 and New Jack City.

Mary Decker Tabb Slaney, 48, Olympic track star, mile record 4:16.71.

Billy Bob Thornton, 51, actor, Sling Blade, former husband of Angelina Jolie.

Helen Thomas, 86, journalist, covering the White House as a correspondent since President-Elect John F. Kennedy in 1960.

Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong, jazz trumpeter, One of the greatest American musicians.

[Post by NewMexiKen reader Becci. Armstrong always said he was born on July 4, 1900, but it was, in fact, August 4, 1901.]

It’s the birthday

… of Tony Bennett. He’s 80. There was a nice tribute/review in yesterday’s Times.

… of Martin Sheen, 66. Sheen won one Golden Globe for West Wing, but no Emmys. He did win an Emmy once for a guest role on Murphy Brown.

… of Martha Stewart, 65.

… of Jay North (TV’s Dennis the Menace). He’s 55.

… of quarterback Tom Brady, 29.

Columbus set sail from Palos, Spain, on this date in 1492.

Ernie Pyle

… was born on this date in 1900. Until he was killed by enemy fire in April 1945, Pyle “blogged” World War II for millions of Americans.

From The New York Times obituary.

Ernie Pyle was haunted all his life by an obsession. He said over and over again, “I suffer agony in anticipation of meeting people for fear they won’t like me.”

No man could have been less justified in such a fear. Word of Pyle’s death started tears in the eyes of millions, from the White House to the poorest dwellings in the country.

President Truman and Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt followed his writings as avidly as any farmer’s wife or city tenement mother with sons in service.

Mrs. Roosevelt once wrote in her column “I have read everything he has sent from overseas,” and recommended his writings to all Americans.

For three years these writings had entered some 14,000,000 homes almost as personal letters from the front. Soldiers’ kin prayed for Ernie Pyle as they prayed for their own sons.

NewMexiKen has before posted this quote from Pyle, but why not do so again on his birthday, and because there’s no place like home.

Yes, there are lots of nice places in the world. I could live with considerable pleasure in the Pacific Northwest, or in New England, on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, or in Key West or California or Honolulu. But there is only one of me, and I can’t live in all those places. So if we can have only one house — and that’s all we want — then it has to be in New Mexico, and preferably right at the edge of Albuquerque where it is now. Ernie Pyle, January 1942

Pyle’s home on Girard SE is now a branch of the Albuquerque/Bernalillo County Library System.

Today’s birthdays

Seven-time Oscar nominee for best actor, Peter O’Toole is 74 today.

Director-writer-producer Wes Craven is 67.

Eddie Munster, aka actor Butch Patrick, is 53.

Emmy-winner, for Angels in America, Mary Louise Parker is 42.

Actress Myrna Loy was born on this date in 1905. IMDB has her listed for an incredible 138 roles, beginning with silent films when she was the femme fatale, but more famously as the witty, urbane Nora Charles in The Thin Man movies. NewMexiKen liked her in The Best Years of Our Lives, a film everyone should see. It won seven Academy Awards in 1946.

Author James Baldwin was born on this date in 1924.

After writing a number of pieces that were published in various magazines, Baldwin went to Switzerland to finish his first novel. GO TELL IT ON THE MOUNTAIN, published in 1953, was an autobiographical work about growing up in Harlem. The passion and depth with which he described the struggles of black Americans was unlike anything that had been written. Though not instantly recognized as such, GO TELL IT ON THE MOUNTAIN has long been considered an American classic. Throughout the rest of the decade, Baldwin moved from Paris to New York to Istanbul, writing NOTES OF A NATIVE SON (1955) and GIOVANNI’S ROOM (1956). Dealing with taboo themes in both books (homosexuality and interracial relationships, respectively), Baldwin was creating socially relevant and psychologically penetrating literature. (American Masters | PBS)

James Butler Hickok was killed while playing poker in Deadwood 130 years ago today.

Rags to riches

“She was living in Scotland as a single mother, and her apartment was unheated, so she would go to the local café and write, while her daughter slept in the baby carriage. She eventually quit her job and lived on public assistance to finish the book.” (The Writer’s Almanac)

And so the book was published in 1998 and today she is a billionaire (a first ever for an author).

J.K. Rowling, 41 today.

According to another source Rowling has denied the lack of heat in her flat: “I am not stupid enough to rent an unheated flat, in Edinburgh, in mid-winter; it had heating.” Still, a good Dickensian touch, that.

Birthday boys and girls

Edd “Kookie Kookie lend me your comb” Byrnes is 73.

Oscar nominee (direction and co-writer, The Last Picture Show) Peter Bogdanovich is 67.

Paul Anka is 65. Anka is not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The Governator, Arnold Schwarzenegger, is 59.

Actress Delta Burke and blues guitarist Buddy Guy are 50. I like the thought of them partying together today.

Lisa Kudrow is 43.

Two-time Oscar winner Hilary Swank is 32.

The Hall of Fame manager Casey Stengel was born on this date in 1890.

MANAGED NEW YORK YANKEES 1949-1960.
WON 10 PENNANTS AND 7 WORLD SERIES WITH
NEW YORK YANKEES. ONLY MANAGER TO WIN
5 CONSECUTIVE WORLD SERIES 1949-1953.
PLAYED OUTFIELD 1912-1925 WITH BROOKLYN,
PITTSBURGH, PHILADELPHIA, NEW YORK AND
BOSTON N.L. TEAMS. MANAGED BROOKLYN
1934-1936, BOSTON BRAVES 1938-1943,
NEW YORK METS 1962-1965.

A few Casey-isms:

“Can’t anybody here play this game?”

“Don’t cut my throat, I may want to do that later myself.”

“Don’t drink in the hotel bar, that’s where I do my drinking.”

“Good pitching will always stop good hitting and vice-versa.”

“He’d (Yogi Berra) fall in a sewer and come up with a gold watch.”

July 28

Catherine Howard married Henry VIII on this date in 1540. She was Mrs. VIII number five.

Maximilien Robespierre got the ax on this date in 1794. Witnesses said Robespierre died within seconds of the guillotine blade severing his head from his neck but, after viewing A Tale of Two Cities, Dr. Senator Bill Frist was certain guillotine victims “respond to visual stimuli.”

Beatrix Potter was born on this date in 1866.

Jacqueline Lee Bouvier was born on this date in 1929.

“Dollar Bill,” Bill Bradley is 63 today.

Hugo Chávez, the President of Venezuela is 52. Venezuela supplies about 6% of U.S. daily oil consumption.

An earthquake in China killed an estimated 242,000 people 30 years ago today.

It’s the birthday

… of television producer Norman Lear. He’s 84. Lear brought a revolution to TV when he introduced All in the Family in 1971. Sanford and Son, Good Times, The Jeffersons, Maude, One Day At a Time and other shows were also his.

Left at Albuquerque… of Bugs Bunny, who made his first featured appearance in a cartoon released on this date in 1940, A Wild Hare. Bugs was modeled on Groucho Marx with a carrot instead of a cigar — and with a Brooklyn accent.

… of Bobbie Gentry; she is 62. No word yet on what it was she and Billy Joe threw off the Tallahatchee bridge.

… of Peggy Fleming, 58 today. Miss Fleming won her gold medal for figure skating at the 1968 Winter Olympics.

Baseball manager Leo Durocher was born 100 years ago today — “The Lip.” His Hall-of-Fame plaque reads in part:

COLORFUL, CONTROVERSIAL MANAGER FOR 24 SEASONS,
WINNING 2,008 GAMES, 7TH ON ALL-TIME LIST.
COMBATIVE, SWASHBUCKLING STYLE A CARRY-OVER
FROM 17 YEARS AS STRONG FIELDING SHORTSTOP FOR
MURDERERS ROW YANKS, GASHOUSE GANG CARDS, REDS
AND DODGERS. MANAGED CLUBS TO PENNANTS IN 1941
AND 1951 AND TO WORLD SERIES WIN IN 1954. 3-TIME
SPORTING NEWS MANAGER OF THE YEAR.

Durocher, who’s language was so salty he must have been from Deadwood, once recalled a remarkable home run by Willie Mays: “I never saw a f…ing ball go out of a f…ing park so f…ing fast in my f…ing life!”

The truce ending the Korean War was signed on this date in 1953. Read the report from The New York Times.

The first U.S. government agency, the Department of Foreign Affairs (which became the Department of State), was established on this date in 1789.

It’s the birthday

… of Mick Jagger. He’s still can’t get no satisfaction, even at 63.

… of two-time Oscar winner Kevin Spacey. He’s 47. Spacey won for best supporting actor for The Usual Suspects and leading actor for American Beauty.

… of Sandra Bullock. From Arlington, Virginia, she’s 42. Ms. Bullock has been an Academy Award presenter.

Two great comediennes were born on this date — Gracie Allen in 1895, 1897 or 1902 (her birth certificate was destroyed in the San Francisco earthquake) and Vivian Vance in 1909.

Because George Burns lived to be 100 and managed to stay in show business nearly until then (playing God in one film, no less), Gracie, who died in 1964 has been largely forgotten. She was the true comedic talent of the two, however. On their radio and television programs George was the straight man, Gracie had the good lines.

At the end of their show, George Burns would say, “Say goodnight, Gracie.” Urban myth has it that she said, “Good night Gracie,” but, in fact, she always just said “Goodnight.”

“Were you the oldest one in the family?” “No, no, my mother and father were much older.” — Gracie Allen

“They laughed at Joan of Arc, but she went right ahead and built it.” — Gracie Allen

“When I was born I was so surprised I didn’t talk for a year and a half.” — Gracie Allen

Vivian Vance was two years older than her long-time co-star Lucille Ball, though many thought Vance to be much older because her I Love Lucy character Ethel Mertz was married to Fred, played by actor William Frawley, who was 18 years older. Miss Vance died of cancer in 1979.

It’s the birthday

… of Estelle Getty. The “Golden Girl” is 83. Ms. Getty won both a Golden Globe and an Emmy for her portrayal as Bea Arthur’s mother. (Bea Arthur is actually two months older than Estelle Getty.)

… of Academy Award nominee Barbara Harris. The actress is 71. Ms. Harris was nominated for best supporting actress for Who Is Harry Kellerman and Why Is He Saying Those Terrible Things About Me?

… of basketball hall-of-famer Nate Thurmond, 65 today.

… of Joey. Matt LeBlanc is 39.

And …

Thomas Eakins, Baseball Players PracticingIt’s the birthdate of painter and photographer Thomas Eakins, born on this date in 1844. “Esteemed for his powers of characterization and mastery of technique, Thomas Eakins (1844-1916) is recognized as one of America’s foremost painters, a master draftsman and watercolorist, and an especially gifted photographer.” The Metropolitan Musuem of Art (source of the preceding quote) had an exhibition of Eakins’s work in 2002, which fortunately remains on line. Click the painting to see the exhibition.

The longshoreman philosopher Eric Hoffer was born on this date in 1902.

It’s the birthday of writer and philosopher Eric Hoffer…, born in New York City (1902). He spent most of his life working on the docks as a longshoreman, and he wrote philosophy in his spare time, including The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements (1951). Eric Hoffer said, “When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other.” (The Writer’s Almanac)

The alto saxophonist Johnny Hodges was born on this date in 1907.

One of the most distinctive solo voices in jazz, Hodges was inextricably bound up with the Duke Ellington Orchestra, which he first joined in [M]ay 1928, remaining for most of the rest of his life, apart from a brief venture into bandleading from 1951-5. His plaintive blues playing was as memorable as his haunting ballad playing, and although he was capable of producing a tone of incredible beauty and intensity, he could also add a jazzy edge to his sound, and play in a jumping swing style. (BBC – Radio 3 Jazz Profiles)

Here’s a too brief but lovely sample of Hodges from iTunes. And another.

It’s also the birthday of NewMexiKen’s dad. Happy Birthday, Dad!

It’s the birthday

… of Cosmo Kramer. Michael Richards is 57 today.

… of Wonder Woman. Lynda Carter is 55.

… of Barry Bonds. He’s 42.

… of Kristin Chenoweth. The Tony award-winner is 38.

… of J Lo. Jennifer Lopez is 36.

… of Anna Paquin. An Oscar winner at age 11, she’s now 24.

It’s the birthday

… of jazz pianist Billy Taylor. He’s 85.

… of Janet Reno, the first woman attorney general of the United States. She is 68.

… of actor Edward Herrmann. He is 63.

… of Doonesbury cartoonist Garry Trudeau. He’s 58.

… of Mork. Robin Williams is 55. Williams has been nominated for the best actor Oscar three times without winning. He did win the best supporting actor Oscar for Good Will Hunting.

… of Jon Lovitz. He’s 49. Fresh!

Carlos Santana

… was born in Autlan de Navarro, Mexico, 59 years ago today. His family migrated to the U.S. in the 1960s.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame introduces inductee Santana this way —

Guitarist Carlos Santana is one of rock’s true virtuosos and guiding lights. Since 1966, he has led the group that bears his surname, selling over 30 million albums and performing before 13 million people. Though numerous musicians have passed through Santana’s ranks, the continuing presence of Carlos Santana at the helm has insured high standards. From the earliest days, when Santana first overlaid Afro-Latin rhythms upon a base of driving blues-rock, they have been musical sorcerers. The melodic fluency and kineticism of Santana’s guitar solos and the piercing, sustained tone that is his signature have made him one of rock’s standout instrumentalists. Coupled with the polyrhythmic fury of drums, congas and timbales, the sound of Santana in full flight is singularly exciting. Underlying it all is Santana’s belief that music should “create a bridge so people can have more trust and hope in humanity.”

On this date

Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger was published on this date in 1951. It’s sold about 60 million copies since.

Major John Glenn, USMC, set a transcontinental (Los Angeles to New York) speed record of 3 hours, 23 minutes and 8 seconds on this date in 1957. Average speed: 723 mph.

Will Ferrell was born on this date in 1967.

Apollo 11 left Florida for the moon on this date in 1969.

It’s the birthday

Linda Ronstadt Time… of Alex Karras, All-American, Heisman runner-up (and he was a lineman), Outland Award winner, NFL star (1958-1971), Monday Night Football sportscaster, TV sitcom actor and — most notably — Mongo in Blazing Saddles. He’s 71 today. That’s the number he wore with the Detroit Lions.

… of Tucson’s favorite daughter, Linda Ronstadt, 60 today. Miss Ronstadt has sold more than 66 million albums worldwide. The session band behind her on her third album became The Eagles.

… of Forest Whitaker, 45. Whitaker has been in more than 60 films and television productions, most notably Good Morning, Vietnam, The Crying Game and as Charlie “Bird” Parker in Bird (which earned him best actor at Cannes).

Rembrandt Van Rijn was born in Leiden, Netherlands on this date in 1606.

The eagle has landed

Former President Gerald R. Ford is 93 today. He was born as Leslie L. King, Jr., on this date in 1913. He took the name Gerald Rudolf Ford, Jr., when adopted by his stepfather.

Ford is the second oldest former president ever, after Ronald Reagan, who died at age 93 years, four months. John Adams and Herbert Hoover both lived to be 90.

NewMexiKen had several meetings with President Ford in the years after he left office in 1977. In fact it can be said that on one two-day occasion in 1979 I helped him clean his garage. The most astonishing incident, however, was in 1981.

The Gerald R. Ford Museum was about to be dedicated in Grand Rapids. As the representative of the National Archives nearest Ford’s retirement office in Rancho Mirage, California, I was called with an urgent request. It seemed flags had not been ordered for the replica Oval Office in the Museum. President Ford would lend them his. I was asked to go to his office, pick them up and ship them to Michigan.

The next morning I was ushered into the former President’s office. He was standing at his desk browsing through some papers. After the routine “Hello, Ken” and “Hello, Mr. President” exchange, I went about my business with the flags. He continued his business with the papers.

The U.S. flag was on a brass stand with two wooden staff pieces screwed together at the middle and a brass eagle, wings outstretched, at the top, about seven feet from the floor. I unscrewed the two pieces of the staff, a task made difficult by the weight of the flag and the eagle above.

As I began to lower the top half at an angle, the eagle took flight. It was just set on the top of the staff, not screwed on as it should have been.

Stop and picture this. The former President of the United States is a few feet away. His gorgeous White House presidential desk is even closer. And we have a brass eagle weighing several pounds in free fall. I’m holding the flag and can’t do anything but watch.

Poor President Ford I thought, he is about to be in the news for being clunked (or worse!) by a flagpole eagle in his own office — and this after years of being portrayed by Chevy Chase on Saturday Night Live as a clumsy, stumble-prone klutz. (In reality Gerald Ford was an All-American football player at Michigan in the 1930s and still looked exceptionally fit at 68.)

It wasn’t my fault the eagle hadn’t been attached but I was about to be a footnote to history.

Amazingly, the eagle missed Mr. Ford. Even more miraculously, it missed the historic desk and fell harmlessly to the carpet with a thud.

The former President had to have noticed. He never said a word. For that alone he has my enduring admiration.

Happy Birthday, Mr. President.

Woodrow Wilson Guthrie

… was born in Okemah, Oklahoma, on this date in 1912. We, of course, know him as Woody Guthrie.

This from David Hajdu in a review in The New Yorker earlier this year of a new biography of Guthrie:

…”This Land Is Your Land,” a song that most people likely think they know in full. The lyrics had been written in anger, as a response to Irving Berlin’s “God Bless America,” which Woody Guthrie deplored as treacle. In addition to the familiar stanzas (“As I went walking that ribbon of highway,” and so on), Guthrie had composed a couple of others, including this:

One bright sunny morning in the shadow of the steeple
By the Relief Office I saw my people—
As they stood hungry, I stood there wondering if
God Blessed America for me.

There’s an American Masters program on Guthrie currently in circulation on PBS.

I ain’t never got nowhere yet
But I got there by hard work

Woody Guthrie died in 1967.

It’s the birthday

… of Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Patrick Stewart is 66.

… of Bob Falfa. That’s Harrison Ford. He’s 64. And yes, Ford, who at one time had been in seven of the ten top grossing films of all times, has an Oscar nomination — for best actor in Witness.

… of Roger McGuinn, an inductee of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Byrds.

As Roger McGuinn once said of the Byrds, “It was Dylan meets the Beatles.” The Byrds combined the upbeat, melodic pop of the Beatles with the message-oriented lyrics of Bob Dylan into a wholly original amalgam that would be branded folk-rock. If only for their harmony-rich versions of Dylan’s “Mr. Tambourine Man” and Pete Seeger’s “Turn! Turn! Turn!,” drenched in the 12-string jangle of McGuinn’s Rickenbacker guitar, the Byrds would have earned their place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Yet the group continually broke ground during the Sixties, creating revelatory syntheses of sound that were given such hyphenated names as space-rock (“5D [Fifth Dimension]”), psychedelic-rock (“Eight Miles High”) and country-rock (their Sweethearts of the Rodeo album). At a time when rock and roll was exploding in all fronts, the Byrds led the way with an insatiable curiosity about the forms and directions pop music could take. In so doing, they became peers and equals of their mentors, Dylan and the Beatles.

… of Pedro de Pacas. Richard ‘Cheech’ Marin is 60.

Happy Birthday to You

Donald Rumsfeld is 74. This from The Writer’s Almanac:

It’s the birthday of the Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, born in Chicago, Illinois (1932). In 2003, he published Rumsfeld’s Rules: Wisdom for the Good Life, a list of guidelines for his colleagues that he’d gathered over the years. It includes advice such as, “It is easier to get into something than to get out of it.”

Brian Dennehy is 68 — guess he’ll be playing one of the old folks in any re-make of Cocoon. Dennehy won a Golden Globe and a Screen Actors Guild award for his portrayal of Willy Loman in the 2000 made-for-TV presentation of Death of a Salesman.

Chris Cooper is 55. Cooper has appeared in over 50 films and television productions, winning a best supporting actor Oscar for Adaptation.

Jimmy Smits is 51. Smits was nominated six times for an Emmy for supporting actor for L..A. Law. He won once. He was nominated five times for best actor for NYPD Blue. No nominations for his work as Senator Bail Organa in Star Wars. But, then he was elected President on West Wing.

Tom Hanks is 50 today. Hanks has been nominated for the Academy Award for best actor five times, winning for Philadelphia (1993) and Forrest Gump (1994). His other nominations were for Big, Saving Private Ryan and Cast Away.

Kelly McGillis is 49, Courtney Love is 42, and Fred Savage is 30.

And Orenthal James Simpson is 59 today.

(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)

Yeah, I’ve been searchin’
A-a searchin’
Oh, yeah, searchin’ every which a-way
Yeah, yeah
Oh, yeah, searchin’
I’m searchin’
Searchin’ every which a-way
Yeah, yeah
But I’m like the Northwest Mounties
You know I’ll bring ’em in someday
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)

Well, now, if I have to swim a river
You know I will
And a if I have to climb a mountain
You know I will
And a if he’s a hiding up
On a blueberry hill
Am I gonna find ’em, child
You know I will
‘Cause I’ve been searchin’
Oh, yeah, searchin’
My goodness, searchin’ every which a-way
Yeah, yeah
But I’m like the Northwest Mounties
You know I’ll bring ’em in some day
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)

Well, Sherlock Holmes
Sam Spade got nothin’, child, on me
Sergeant Friday, Charlie Chan
And Boston Blackie
No matter where he’s a hiding
He’s gonna hear me a comin’
Gonna walk right down that street
Like Bulldog Drummond
‘Cause I’ve been searchin’
Oooh, Lord, searchin’, mm child
Searchin’ every which a-way
Yeah, yeah
But I’m like the Northwest Mounties
You know I’ll bring ’em in some day
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)

It’s the birthday

… of Anjelica Huston. The third generation Oscar winner is 55. Anjelica won the best supporting actress Oscar for Prizzi’s Honor; she has two other nominations. Her father John was nominated for 15 writing, directing or acting Oscars, winning director and writing for The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Grandfather Walter was nominated four times for acting Oscars, winning the supporting award for The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.

… of Kevin Bacon. He’s 48. And no, Kevin Bacon has never been nominated for an Oscar. He’s only a few degrees of separation however, from many who have.

Nelson Rockefeller, grandson of John D., was born on his grandfather’s birthday in 1908. Rockefeller was governor of New York 1959-1973 and vice president 1974-1977. He died in 1979. NewMexiKen once witnessed Rockefeller stirring his coffee with the temple of his eyeglasses. It was kind of endearing.