Pat's cousin in Georgia has just sent us a gift Santa Claus head toilet seat cover! Amazing. This merits a full retaliatory strike.
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Question: What are the Halcyon Days?

Answer to yesterday’s question below: An Australian astronomer has estimated that Jesus may have been born in June. So, was Jesus really born on Christmas..?
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History for 12/13/2008
Birthdays: Heinrich Heine, Mary Todd Lincoln, Dick Van Dyke is 83, Mike Mosley, Darryl Zanuck Jr., George Schulz, Tim Conway, Ted Nugent, Christopher Plummer is 79, Steve Buscemi is 51, Jamie Fox is 41, Lynn Holly Johnson, Wendy Malick

Today is the Feast of Saint Lucy, who was ordered by the Romans to be violated in a brothel, set on fire, stabbed to death, and to stop men saying how beautiful her eyes were she ripped them out and handed them over on a plate. But they miraculously grew back. So Lucy is the patron saint of opticians.



863- Duke Baldwin Iron Arm married Lady Judith du Kales.

1264- THE CREATION OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS- Victorious rebel English Earl Simon de Monfort calls for a meeting in Westminster of a Parliament of all nobles, clergy and - common folk of the realm. It's probably the first time since the ancient Roman republic anybody had asked the people their opinion about anything. King Henry III and Prince Edward Longshanks couldn't argue because Simon had them locked up in the Tower. To make final sure Earl Simon ordered bishops to pronounce the most fearful oaths of excommunication and anathema on the head of anyone who dared to undo his creation. So even after Longshanks escaped and had Earl Simon chopped into mincemeat, the House of Commons remained.

1642- Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in the Pacific discovered a big island near Australia and named it for the Dutch province of Zeeland, so New Zealand. He also found another island and called it Van Deimans Land, but it was later named in his honor as Tasmania.

1862-BATTLE OF FREDERICKSBURG- Union General Ambrose Burnside (who created the men’s fashion-"sideburns") made his men frontal attack uphill an impregnable Confederate position of concentrated fire that :" a chicken couldn't live through."
The massed regiments of bluecoats were mowed down wave after wave in one of the worst disasters in U.S. Army history. The New York Fighting 69th, the all Irish brigade, fell dead in even rows shielding their eyes from the bullets as though they were rain. They shouted “Faugh au Ballagh !” Gaelic for “Clear the Way!” They left 53% of their men dead on the field. In all 13,000 Yankees died to a mere handful of rebels. One rebel general, sickened by the stupidity of it all, said: "This ain't war, it's just plain murder." After the defeat, Burnside rode past some of his men, a kissass major tried shouting :"Three cheers for the General!" and was met with stony silence. When the Yankees defeated the rebels at Gettysburg a year later they shouted "Fredericksburg! Fredericksburg!' in revenge at the retreating greybacks.

1872- Wild Bill Hickok was fired as sheriff of Abilene Kansas because he was more violent and out of control than most of the men he arrested.

1895- Gustav Mahlers 2nd Symphony “Resurrection” premiered.

1928- Leopold Damrosch conducted the premiere of George Gershwin's -"An American in Paris."

1936- At the urging of New Yorker editor Harold Ross to find a better line of work, actor Dave Chasen opened Chasen's restaurant in Beverly Hills, which catered to Hollywood stars for 60 years. It is the restaurant where Leopold Stokowski was introduced to Walt Disney and as a result they conceived "Fantasia". Humphrey Bogart, John Huston and Lauren Bacall met upstairs to discuss the Blacklist of 1947. Elizabeth Taylor ordered Chasen’s chili flown out to Rome so she could eat it on the set of Cleopatra. The restaurant closed in 1995 because the Chasen family wanted to cash in on the real estate. Today it’s a supermarket.

1939- Battle of the River Platte- The German pocket battleship Graff Spee battled with several British cruisers near the Argentine coastline. The German then put into the neutral port of Montevideo for repairs. One interesting detail about ships firing heavy guns at each other is firing officers don't aim at each other's ships but they aim at where the ship will be one minute from now, because that's the time the shell takes to travel 13 plus miles to hit it. If you ever want to avoid battleship fire one trick is to steer into the splashes of the misses, because while the enemy is adjusting it's aim you're moving into the old coordinates. Don’t say I never give you advice.

1940- Fleischer Popeye cartoon "Eugene the Jeep" .The Thimble Theater character would give its name to the new army General Purpose vehicle- G.P. or "Jeep".



1951- One of the legendary Hollywood producers was Walter Wanger- starting in 1921 his films included The Sheik, Stagecoach, Queen Christina, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Silk Stockings and Cleopatra. His wife was beautiful starlet Joan Bennett, but at this time she had taken a lover. On this day Wanger surprised Hollywood by pulling out a gun and shooting his wife's lover in the nuts right in the MCA studio parking lot. In true Hollywood fashion Wanger got off, sentenced to just a few months in an honor ranchero compound and was soon back to work. Contributors to pay his legal fees included the Jack Warner, Walt Disney and Sam Goldwyn. The boyfriend, Jennings Lang, recovered and later became an executive producer of comedies like House Calls. After all, who needs balls to be a producer?

1961- Jimmy Dean’s folk ballad Big Bad John went to #1 of the country charts. Later Dean had his own TV variety show starring early Muppet star Rolf the Dog, and started Jimmy Dean’s Pure Pork Sausage Company.

1969- Arlo Guthrie’s hit song Alice’s Restaurant released.

1996- In Terry Gilliams’ sci-fi apocalypse epic the Plague of the 12 Monkeys was unleashed today, a virus that killed 4/5ths of the world’s population and drove the remainder underground.

2002-Cardinal Bernard Law resigned in disgrace. The Primate of Boston, the largest Roman Catholic diocese in the United States. Cardinal Law had spent years covering for priests who molested children given them by trusting parents. He even protected a priest who’s name was openly registered in the Man-Boy Love Society. Law was the highest ranking Catholic to step down from popular pressure. Modern republics regard power as coming from the people. Historically the Catholic Church regards itself above the complaints of the flock, that they are answerable to God alone. So this was pretty unusual. In the past, the usual way to get rid of Cardinals was to drag them out of their castles and chop their heads off like Archbishop Laud of England in 1641.

2003-Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was pulled out of a hiding hole and captured by U.S. forces near his hometown of Tikrit.
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Yesterday’s question: An Australian astronomer has estimated that Jesus may have been born in June. So, was Jesus really born on Christmas..?

Answer: No scholar is sure when Jesus was really born. He was born in obscurity, and his public life mission didn’t really begin until he was age 30. The there are not enough surviving records from the Roman Empire about the census ordered by Augustus and administered by the Provincial Governor Quirinus. But scholars doubt they would have held it in the winter months. The census story is only mentioned in one of the four Gospels.
The Australian astronomer claimed his calculations on tracing a potential candidate for the Star of Bethlehem, said an alignment of Jupiter and Venus made a daytime star in 2BC. But that means Jesus was born in June. Chinese astronomers in 6BC recorded a supernova that occurred in July. So everyone is guessing.
The December solstice was the biggest festival in the Roman calendar, the feast of Saturnalia, when people gave each other gift-wrapped presents and decorated their houses with lights ( oil lamps). Dec 24th was the Feast of Mithras, the other big religion in the Empire. Christians began celebrating Jesus birth in place of the Saturnalia since AD300. the Vatican named Dec 25th the Birth Festival of Jesus or Christ-Mass in 885 AD.

Animation producer/writer Steve Leiva currently has a piece on the LA Times blogspot on the early unsuccessful effort to bring Will Eisner's The Spirit to the screen as an animated feature.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/herocomplex/

In 1980 Brad Bird (The Incredibles), Gary Kurtz (American Graffiti and Star Wars), Jerry Rees (The Marrying Man) and Leiva optioned the film rights to "The Spirit" from Will Eisner in order to develop it into an animated feature. He writes: Written and to be directed by Brad, we intended "The Spirit" to be a revolutionary and -- we were convinced -- very successful animated feature. This was at a time when people were declaring Disney animation near dead, and upcoming animated features were along the lines of "The Care Bears Movie."
The article features a great snapshot of Steve, Brad and Will Eisner as young sprouts.

Interesting what-if.

we hear today of the death at age 85 of former pinnup model BETTIE PAGE. Bettie was a star of underground naughty photos that dwelled in the dreams of many a young man coming of age in the 1950s and 60s.



In an age of breast enhancements, tip & tuck surgeries and photoshop touching up, when you look at Bettie you are seeing the real thing, all natural. Her countenance was at once shy, wholesome, vulnerable, yet wanton and powerful. Her special power is that even in the most exploitative photos, she always looks very much in charge and enjoying herself.

She was never that successful a legitimate actress, no John Waters around then. She underwent a strong religious conversion in middle age and renounced her naughtier past. But her reputation was restored by cartoon Dave Stevens in his Rocketeer series. Coincidentally Dave died himself earlier this year after a long battle with leukemia.



Bettie shrewdly refused all attempts to photo her today. Like Marlena Dietrich, she wanted to maintain the mystique of her former youthful beauty. The Queen of retro kitsch imagery.

Adieu Bettie! Your legend will live on.


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Question: An Australian astronomer has estimated that Jesus may have been born in June.
So, was Jesus really born on Christmas..?

Yesterday’s Question answered below: What does Michael Phelps have in common with Johnny Weissmuller ( Tarzan) and Buster Crabbe ( Flash Gordon) ?
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History for 12/12/2008
Birthdays: Frank Sinatra, Roman Emperor Alexander Severus, Edvard Munch, Gustav Flaubert, Auguste Rodin, Cherokee Confederate General Stand Watie, John Jay, Edward G. Robinson- real name Emmanuel Goldenberg, Field Marshal Karl Von Rundstedt-the Black Knight of Germany, former NY Mayor Ed Koch, Zack Mosley –the cartoonist who drew “Smilin' Jack", Connie Francis, Dionne Warwick, Cathy Rigby, Tracy Austin, Tom Wilkinson is 60, Bill Nighy is 69, Jennifer Connelly is 38

1653- Puritan General Oliver Cromwell, having executed King Charles I, declares himself Lord Protector of England and rules as dictator. He had all the symbols of monarchy including the crown jewels destroyed. Including the ancient Iron Crown of Alfred the Great. This is why England's crown jewels date from the 1660’s, after Cromwell. Scotland's crown jewels were smuggled out of Edinburgh Castle ahead of Cromwell's troops in a berry basket.

1793-WASHINGTON THE SLAVEMASTER- The most concrete evidence we have that George Washington was morally disturbed about owning slaves. This day George Washington wrote a friend in England about his plan to carve up his Mt. Vernon estate into small lots and rent them out to immigrant English tenant farmers, so he could liberate his slaves. He asked his British correspondent to keep his plan a secret and destroy this note after reading it. He never went ahead with his plan but after he and Martha were both dead, Washington’s will freed all 137 of his slaves and sent each off with a cash pension. Compare that to Thomas Jefferson, who freed 6 out of 300 when he died and James Madison, author of the Bill of Rights, who freed none.

1897-The Katzemjammer Kids comic strip by Rudolph Dirks appears. The adventures of Hans & Fritz was so popular a rival Hearst newpaper started an imitation called the Captain and the Kids, leading to the first artistic plagiarism lawsuit. Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas had a problem whenever they bought the American newspapers for their Paris salon, because Picasso and Fernand Oliver would fight over who got to read the comics first.

1899- George Grant of Boston invented the Golf Tee.

1901-First transatlantic wireless signal received by Guglielmo Marconi. This finally ended the frustrating hoopla over laying transatlantic telegraph cables and have them break down almost constantly since the 1850s. The pioneers of radio broadcasting like Armstrong, Lee Deforrest and David Sarnoff got their start working for the Marconi Wireless Company.

1922-Nickolai Lenin suffered the first of a series of strokes that left him too sick to work. He ruled Soviet Russia for one more year as a figurehead while his true state of health was concealed from the public. Top Communist officials like Trotsky and Stalin now fought for power. When Lenin died in Jan.1924 doctors examining his brain said the blood clots were as solid as small stones. The only words he could mumble from his paralyzed mouth was “That’s it. That’s it.”

1925- The world’s first Motel opened. Arthur Heinman opened the Milestone Motel in San Luis Obispo California.

1941- In the emergency after Pearl Harbor the U.S. Army ordered all peacetime airliners and pilots commandeered into military service. Federal customs authorities in the port of New York also seized the worlds largest luxury ocean liner, The French S.S Normandie, for “protective custody”. Remember at this time France was an occupied part of the Third Reich.

1952- The first Screen Actors Guild Strike. President Walter Pidgeon -Dr. Morbius in Forbidden Planet- had the movie stars hit the bricks to win television and commercial residuals.


The final deals were settled by then SAG president Ronald Reagan in 1960. Ronnie compromised with the studio heads (who later backed his bid for the governorship of California) that only residuals for films after 1955 would be paid. The studios made it known to the membership that if you didn’t vote for Reagan you can forget about your residuals. So the deal was struck. Actors who made their big hits in the 30's and 40s like Laurel and Hardy, the Marx Brothers, The Little Rascals and Mickey Rooney were left out. Mickey Rooney, who's Andy Hardy movies were the box office champs of the mid-1940's put it mildly: "Reagan screwed me !!"

1980- The song “Whip It” by Devo won a gold record.

1991-Actor Richard Gere married supermodel Cindy Crawford.

2000- THE SUPREME COURT PICKED THE PRESIDENT. In the tightest presidential election since 1877, The Supreme Court ruled on the case Bush Vs Gore. The High Court decided George W. Bush won over Vice President Al Gore. They stated that although there may have been irregularities in the vote counting in the decisive state of Florida, it was too late and pointless to continue the recount, so they were suspending all further appeals. Al Gore and the Democrats quickly caved in and squelched attempts by African-American congressmen to point out vote discrimination. In 1960 the difference between Nixon and Kennedy was around 100,000 votes in a population of 150 million people- in 2000 Bush’s lead was down to a mere 140 votes in one Florida county, out of a population of 350 million.
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Yesterday’s Question: What does Michael Phelps have in common with Johnny Weissmuller ( Tarzan) and Buster Crabbe ( Flash Gordon) ?

Answer: They are all Gold Medal winning Olympic swimmers.

Question: What does Michael Phelps have in common with Johnny Weissmuller ( Tarzan) and Buster Crabbe ( Flash Gordon) ?

Yesterday’s Question answered below: What was the first nation to adopt the Metric System?
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History for 12/11/2008
Birthdays: Sir David Brewster,1781- inventor of the kaleidoscope, Fiorello LaGuardia, Robert Koch, conqueror of tuberculosis, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Carlo Ponti, Gilbert Roland, Big Mama Mabel Thornton, Jean Marais, Jean Louis Tritignant, Tom Hayden, Jermaine Jackson, McCoy Tyner- John Coltrane's pianist, singer Brenda Lee, Rita Moreno is 77, Mos Def, Teri Garr is 61

711AD- death of Byzantine Emperor Justinian II Rhino-Nose. Gotta love that nickname.

1718- After many wars Swedish King Charles XII the "Madman of the North" was shot and killed by a Danish sergeant while peeping over a trench parapet. He was a brilliant general but had a bad habit of getting too close to the action for a look. The day before his great battle at Poltava with Russian Czar Peter the Great Charles had been shot and had to direct the battle from a stretcher. He lost.

1785-French artist Jean Baptiste Greuze was well known for making popular paintings of simple scenes like Young Girl Weeping For Her Dead Bird. This day he went to the Paris police prefect and accused his wife Gabriele Babuti of “Persistently receiving lovers into his home over his protests, stealing large sums of his money, and trying to batter in his head with a chamber pot.” He was granted a legal separation.

1793- Last July when the French Revolutionary Convention heard of the assassination of their great radical leader Jean Paul Marat one delegate called out “David ! We Need You!” This day Jacques David unveiled his painting THE DEATH OF MARAT for the first time.



1816- Indiana admitted to the union.

1882- The Bijou Theater in Boston presented Gilbert and Sullivan’s Iolanthe in the first show completely illuminated by electric light bulbs.

1926- Josephine Baker performed her banana dance in Amsterdam.

1927- THE LADY VANISHES- 35 year old mystery writer Agatha Christie caused a mystery herself when she disappeared, leaving her car abandoned by a local brook. The search for the body sensationalized the London press, even knocking the death of Eduard Manet off the front page. Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle employed the first use of a police psychic. Finally after a week Mrs Christie turned up at a health spa in Yorkshire. She was depressed when she earned her husband Sir Archibald Christie of the Guards was having an affair with a younger lady. She ran off and registered in the hotel using her younger rivals name as her alias- Mrs Neal.

1929- Frenchman Charles Cros patented a searchlight he declared he would use to signal civilizations on Mars and Venus. Nobody's returned the call yet.

1936- In a dramatic speech broadcast on radio British King Edward VIII abdicated his throne to be with "The Woman I Love" - to marry the American divorcee' Wallace Simpson. He had been king of the British Empire for 325 days. His brother George became George VI, the father of the present Elizabeth II. He and Wallace later became Duke and Duchess of Windsor and lived outside of England for the rest of their lives.

The Nazis had planned after they had conquered England to put Edward back on the throne as a puppet. Edward Windsor never quite dismissed the rumors that he secretly sympathized with Nazi ideology and while governor of Bermuda had many parties and dinners with socialites who were known Nazi intelligence agents. After the Windsors died, their French chateau was purchased by Mohammed Al Fayed, the father of Princess Diana’s boyfriend Dodie Al Fayed.

1941- Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy declared war on the United States, honoring their Tripartite axis pact with Japan. Hermann Goering protested to Hitler that the Japanese had so far not been of any help to them, they refused to declare war on Russia. Why invite another mighty foe? Hitler sniffed:’ The Americans will be our enemies eventually, why wait?”

1941- The hopelessly isolated little group of Marines on Wake Island repulsed a Japanese naval task force with heavy casualties. They played possum until the invasion fleet got in very close then hammered them with 16 inch naval shore batteries. To a U.S. still reeling from the shock of the Pearl Harbor attack, the nation was encouraged by the gutsy request broadcast from tiny Wake : "Send us more Japs!"

1941- Gone With The Wind producer David Selznick pitched a movie version of Hitler’s book Mein Kampf to be directed by Alfred Hitchcock and written by Ben Hecht. Mercifully for movie goers the idea was soon dropped.

1946- UNICEF formed.

1950-THE CHOISIN FEW- During the Korean War the last remnants of the US First Marine Division completed their terrible march from the Chosin Resevoir. In subzero conditions they fought their way out of 5 encircling Red Chinese armies and brought out all of their wounded. Col. Chesty Puller, a veteran of Guadalcanal, exhorted his men “Remember you are First Marines, and all the Commies in Hell can’t stop you!” A Life Magazine reporter asked an exhausted soldier trying to eat a frozen can of beans “If I was Santa Claus what would you want me to give you?” The hollow-eyed man replied: “Tomorrow.”

1951- Yankee slugger Joe DiMaggio announced his retirement from baseball.

1957- Rock and Roll singer Jerry Lee Lewis secretly married his 13 year old cousin Myra Gail Brown, while still married to his second wife, who he divorced her when the press broke the story the following April. The incident shot down his meteoric career. Great Balls of Fire!

1961- The first contingent of U.S. military advisors arrived in Vietnam.

1962-SAVE THE VILLAGE! Robert Moses was the famous engineer who crisscrossed New York City with bridges and high speed motorways. But many felt the imperious city-planner destroyed whole neighborhoods with little compassion for the inhabitants. Finally he set his sites on a roadway cutting right across Manhattan at Hudson Street to the Holland Tunnel, which would destroy historic Greenwich Village-houses once inhabited by Walt Whitman, Elizabeth Barret-Browning, Kerouac and Twain. But Robert Moses plans were thwarted by an odd alliance of Beatniks, Little Italy Mafia dons, Chinatown merchants and various Village Bohemians lead by author Jane Jacobs. This day after successfully pleading their case the Mayor and the NY City Board of Estimate rejected Moses plan. The Village today remains a gloriously confused muddle of quaint streets.

1964- Soul music star Sam Cooke was shot to death in an argument with a lady who ran an L.A. motel he had brought his girlfriend to.( "Darling you send meee...")

1967- The Concorde SST passenger plane is unveiled in Toulouse. It was a joint venture between England and France. The American SST project was scrapped as too expensive.

1968- Just point your browser and click! Dr. Douglas Englehardt invented the computer Mouse.

1970- Walt Disney's the 'Aristocats'.

1978- THE LUFTHANSA HEIST.- Some small time Brooklyn Mafiosi slipped into the Lufthansa cargo terminal at Kennedy Airport and stole $8 million in unmarked bills and jewelry, most from European money exchange booths. As the FBI moved in on the gang it’s members tended to wind up dead, thirteen bodies in all. The money was never recovered and the reputed mastermind Jimmy the Gent Burke died in prison on an unrelated murder charge in 1991. The incident was dramatized in the Martin Scorcese film “Goodfellas”.
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Yesterday’s Question: What was the first nation to adopt the Metric System?

Answer: Revolutionary France in 1790.

Question: What was the first nation to adopt the metric system?

Yesterday’s Question answered below: What is the difference between a recession and a depression?
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History for 12/10/2008
Birthdays: English King Edward VII “Bertie”, Emile Dickinson, Chet Huntley, Morton Gould, Victor McLaughlin, Dan Blocker,Mako, Tommy Kirk, Fionnula Flanagan, Kenneth Branaugh is 48, Dorothy Lamour, Susan Dey, Michael Clarke Duncan is 51, Gov Rod Blogo- Blogojavich

1513- Former Florentine politician Niccolo Machiavelli was living in a small town after being thrown out of power and even twisted on a torture rack. Still missing his life in power he declared today to a friend he was writing a book on political theory to present to the Medici duke of Florence. He hoped by doing so he’d be called back to office. It didn’t work but his book THE PRINCE became one of the great works of political philosophy, the handbook of unscrupulous politicians everywhere.

1520- Protestant reformer Martin Luther shows the Pope what he thinks of his Bull of Excommunication on him by burning it in public. Pope Leo’s command Exsurge Domine went up in smoke along with the Canons of Roman Church Law to the cheers of students.

1577- The Union of Brussels- The 17 provinces of the Netherlands and Belgium formalize their union. This is why Holland is also known as the United Provinces.

1607- In Virginia Captain John Smith left the Jamestown camp with two men to find food. They were captured by the Indians who killed the other men and dragged Smith before chief Powhatan. He ordered Smith’s head to be placed on a flat stone and bashed in with a war club. But Powhatan’s favorite daughter Pocahontas threw herself over Smith and protected him. Smith could speak no Algonquin and the Indians no English and neither could sing any Broadway tunes. Was this an execution prevented or a ritual of admission into the tribe? Powhatan was known to extend his rule through dynastic alliances with other tribal leaders, and he was well aware of the white strangers, wiping out a Spanish attempt to land on his beach in 1600. Maybe this was his way of wanting to bring the white mans powers to his side. No one knows for sure. Smith didn’t write of this incident until back in England 14 years later.



1864- Sherman’s army reaches the sea at the Georgia coast near Savannah.

1869- Wyoming Territory grants women the vote, the nation follows 58 years later (California in 1911).

1898- Spain and the U.S. make peace ending the Spanish American War. Secretary of State John Hay who was once Abe Lincoln’s secretary called it “A Splendid Little War.” Critics Mark Twain and Ambrose Bierce called it the Yanko-Spanko War. The United States becomes a global power with colonies in Puerto Rico, Guam, Samoa, and the Philippines. The Philippinos, who were fighting for independence under their leaders like Aquinaldo, suddenly discover they were now American property. The U.S. declared they fought for their freedom from Spain yet never officially recognized their national independence movements. The Philippines gained its full independence in 1946 and the last American base Subic Bay wasn’t removed until the 1990s.

1901- The First Nobel Prize is given. Alfred Nobel made millions by inventing dynamite and nitro-glycerine. But as much as his discoveries were used for constructive purposes they also made it possible for armies to blow each other up much more efficiently. He felt guilty and after an accident with the stuff killed his own brother he resolved to create something positive from his fortune. Hence the Nobel Prize. Nobel died on Dec 10th 1896 and the awards are given each year on the anniversary. President Teddy Roosevelt won the first Peace Prize in 1910 for mediating an end to the Russo-Japanese War. In 1950 Dr. Ralph Bunche was the first African-American to receive a Nobel.

1905- O. Henry’s short story “ A gift from the Magi” first published.

1915- President Woodrow Wilson married Edith Bolling Galt in a ceremony in the White House.

1938- To make the film "Gone With the Wind" Producer David Selznick and director Victor Fleming shot the massive "Burning of Atlanta" in Culver City, California. The sequence was storyboarded and designed by William Cameron-Menzies, who designed the sets for Intolerance for D.W. Griffith. Selznick used the opportunity to clean the studios backlot storage, destroying sets from King Kong, Little Lord Fauntelroy and Last of the Mohicans in the inferno. They shot the scenes with three Rhett Butler stand ins.

1941- The New York Metropolitan Opera announced that in light of the Pearl Harbor attack they were suspending any further performances of Madame Butterfly. Other opera companies also stopped doing Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Mikado.

1948- The United Nations adopts Article XIX, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The committee spending months drafting the resolution was chaired by the American delegate Eleanor Roosevelt . By this act she debuted not just as a former first lady and widow of FDR but as a stateswoman and diplomat in her own right.

1966- The Beach Boys “Good Vibrations” hit #1 in pop charts.

1967- R&B star Otis Redding and four of his band the Bar Kays were killed in a small plane crash near Madison Wisconsin. Redding had recorded his hit “Sitting on the Dock of the Bay” just three days earlier.

1974- Powerful Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee Congressman Wilbur Mills resigned in disgrace after revelations emerged about his being busted by the DC police for getting drunk with a stripper named Fanne Fox and taking her for a 2:00 AM nude dip in the Tidal Basin near the Jefferson Memorial. Fanne was christened the “Tidal Basin Bombshell.”

1994- The Unabomber sent an explosive device that killed Thomas J. Mosser, an advertising executive at Young & Rubicam who handled the public relations for Exxon after the Exxon Valdez oil spill.

1995- Worst recorded snowstorm in Buffalo, NY history. 37.9 inches in just 24 hours!
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Yesterday’s Question: The global economic turmoil has been called a Recession. Sunday a former Sect’y of the Treasury first used the word Depression. What is the difference between a recession and a depression?

Answer: Economists still argue over the exact difference between the two. I recall a Nobel winning economist during the 1980s recession saying there was no difference. Many now say a Recession is after two quarters of stagnant growth, a Depression is a complete collapse of the economy. But it is too early to say. This current economic crisis only began on Sept 15th, the Great Depression began in 1929 ( 1926 in UK) and hit rock bottom in 1932 and lasted a decade. US unemployment now is at 6%, the Depression 25%, 50% in many major cities. Prices dropped 60% in the 1930s, some Deflation is beginning already. So stay tuned.