Quiz: Was there any deliberative legislative body between the Ancient Roman Senate
(476AD), and the English House of Commons (1292)..?

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below: Who was Pinto Colvig?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
History for 8/21/2008
Birthdays: King Phillip II Augustus of France- 1165, King William IV of England- 1765, Aubrey Beardsley, Count Basie*, Wilt (the Stilt) Chamberlain, Isadore "Friz" Freleng, Kenny Rogers, British Princess Margaret, Matthew Broderick, Peter Weir is 64, Kim Catrall is 52. Carrie Anne Moss is 41

*Count Basie's first name was William. When working in a swing band he'd often get to work late which would make the band's director ask “Where is that no-account Basie? “ which in his colloquial slang came out: "Where dat no'count Basie!?" Hence the nickname.

1858- The first Lincoln-Douglas debates. Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas squared off in a series of open air debates for a congressional seat for Illinois. But the main subject was the slavery issue. Douglas, the 'Little Giant" won the election but the debates brought national attention to Lincoln. Douglas had even courted Lincoln's wife Mary before they were married. After Lincoln was in the White House Douglas was his strong supporter.

1863-THE LAWRENCE KANSAS MASSACRE – In the Western Border States the town of Lawrence Kansas was the center of pro-Union partisan Jayhawkers. Locals called it YankeeTown. Early in the morning this day Confederate guerrilla leader William Clark Quantrill led 450 hard-riding raiders flying black flags into town. Quantrill's Raiders included young pups like Jesse James and Cole Younger. As the wild horsemen galloped up Massachusetts Avenue shooting and burning, Quantrill stood up in his saddle and shouted “Kill! Kill! Kill all the n*gger-loving Yankees!” There was no regular army there. They murdered 200 civilians, mostly defenseless old men and boys. A guerrilla named Rev Larkin Skaggs tore down the Stars & Stripes and dragged it behind his horse in the dirt and dung to the laughter of the troops. There were some regular Confederate officers present who were appalled at the carnage. They later showed their unfired weapons to survivors to witness that they did not take part in the crimes. Rev. Skaggs was shot down by a Delaware Indian as he tried to ride out of town. The citizens dragged his scalped corpse up and down the main street shooting it and pelting it with stones. It was later tossed into a ravine for wild dogs to eat. Many people never recovered from the nightmare. In 1865 at the end of the Civil War, William Quantrill was brought down in a hail of bullets.

1887- Mighty (Dan) Casey struck out at his last at bat with the NY Giants. The poem was written many years later.

1911- Café waiter Vincenzo Perruggia walked into the Louvre and stole the Mona Lisa. After trying to fence it for two years, he tried to ransom it back. In 1913 he was arrested and the painting recovered.
.
1922 - Curly Lambeau & Green Bay Football Club formed in 1919 was granted an NFL franchise. Foreigners have pondered the Great American Mystery: Why are the Packers the only US football team not situated near a major American City? That is because at a time when professional football was in it’s infancy a Green Bay meat packing company paid for the teams uniforms.

1929-Mexican artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo marry.

1926- Pardon Us, the first comedy short featuring the new team of Laurel & Hardy. Studio head Hal Roach put the Scottish Stan Laurel and Georgia born hoofer Oliver Hardy together and they became one of the greatest comedy teams in film history.

1935- Big band leader Benny Goodman was having a tough time. His band lost its radio gig when the show Let’s Dance was cancelled. So he and his musicians drove across the country in a small caravan of cars playing various venues on the road. They were told in small towns to stop playing that newfangled Swing music and stick to old standards. One manager in Denver told him:” Don’t you guys know any waltzes? ” By the time they arrived in Los Angeles this day they were thoroughly demoralized. But when they set up in the Palomar Ballroom in Hollywood the crowd was immense! And these kids wanted to jitterbug to the new Swing music! So hit it, Jackson, Awl Reet, Awl Reet!

1944- Moviestar James Cagney, star of Yankee Doodle Dandy, cleared of charges of Communism. The accusations probably had less to do with Cagney's politics and more to do with his Actor’s union activism and his fighting in court the restrictive personal contracts studios put their stars under.

1967 –New York Mets second baseman Ken Harrelson became the first free agent.

1968- RUSSIAN TANKS CRUSH THE "PRAGUE SPRING' -Soviet forces destroy Alexander Dubchek's experiment of "Socialism with a Human Face." 650.000 Warsaw Pact troops moved into the small country from all sides. Some of the Red Army soldiers moving into Prague were from Asian Siberia and had never seen a western city before. Carlos Casteneda, who was there for a socialist progressive conference, recalled seeing a Soviet tank crash right through a department store glass window. The driver had never seen a glass window that large and didn't think anything was there. A Czech put a sign over the window frame : "NOTHING CAN STOP THE INVINCIBLE RED ARMY !"

1989- The Voyager II satellite spaceprobe flew by the planet Neptune. It was discovered Neptune had a faint ring like Saturn and rotated on it’s side- south-north instead of west to east. Scientists speculated the atmospheric pressure to be so great that it could actually rain diamonds.

2003- A two week heatwave in Europe killed 10,000 in France alone. Most were elderly people sitting in their locked apartments without air conditioning while their families went on their august holidays. President Jacques Chirac was on holiday in Canada.

2017 - Next total solar eclipse visible from North America.
----------------------------------------------------------
Yesterday’s Quiz: Who was Pinto Colvig?

Answer: Vance DeBar “Pinto” Colvig was a vaudeville comic who originated the voice of Walt Disney’s Goofy. In his long career he also created the voice of the original Bozo the Clown, and Gabby for Fleischer’s Gulliver’s Travels. Alls Well! What’s a Rain-ee Day…

Last night the luminaries of Animation gathered at the El Capitan Theater in Hollywood to celebrate the life of Ollie Johnston, the last of Walt Disney’s Nine Old Men. For three and a half hours Leonard Maltin hosted clips, still images of artwork and panels and speakers to remember this softspoken master of our artform. Roy Disney, John Lasseter, Andreas Deja, Glen Keane, Brad Bird, John Musker, Ron Clements, Mark Kirkland, Charles Solomon, Howard Green, and family members including Jeanette and Ted Thomas, and the Johnston family. In the audience were June Foray, Eric Goldberg, Bob Kurtz, Joe Adamson, Jerry Beck, Alice Davis, Bill and Sue Kroyer, as well as Virginia Davis ( Alice in Cartoonland), Margaret Kerry-Wilcox ( the model for Tinkerbell), and Dick Jones ( the voice of Pinocchio, plus many current and former Disney crew.

There were great stories- how his animation seemed effortless, how his pencil seemed to kiss the paper. What great natural actors Ollie and Frank were. One particularly poignant moment. John Lasseter showed a film of when an elderly Ollie was brought to Disneyland and surprised by being reunited with his beloved steam train the Marie-E. Ollie had had to sell it with his house, and was in a bad way after Frank died and his beloved wife Marie was in her last illness. John had purchased the train and had it brought to Disneyland and mounted on the train tracks just to raise Ollies’ spirits. It was hard not to reach for your handkerchief when you saw the look on Ollie's face.

The event was wonderful, but it all made me particularly sad when it was over. Ollie was the last holdout of that wonderful phalanx of Golden Age Disney Animators, now regrouped in Heaven. The ending of the night means they really are now all gone- Frank & Ollie, Milt, Wooly, Marc Davis, Ward, Eric Larson, Joe Grant, Vance Gerry, Art Stevens, Ken O’Connor, Shamus Culhane, Grim Natwick, Al Eugster. As well as their compatriots in the other studios- Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng, Bob Clampett, Maurice Noble, Ken Harris, Hanna & Barbera, Virgil Ross, Irv Spence, Ben Washam.

Regular readers to this blog might notice that I get particularly emotional when I write about these old predecessors. I apologize if I rhapsodize to the point of being maudlin. I realize that Ollie dying at the age of 95 is a wonderful age. And I might seem to some like just another middle age Boomer lamenting another milestone on the road to lost youth. It’s not that I object to being called an old animator myself now. I don’t.

But you must understand that for the animators of my generation, these people were more than just our teachers, they were our role-models, our guides, our gurus, our idols. We worshipped these people.

Back in a time when there was precious little animation instruction in schools, and there were only one or two how-to books like Preston Blair’s workbook, These people were our graduate school. These old veterans took us under their wing and slowly, painstakingly taught us everything they knew. The encouraged us, guided us, and urged us to one day do better than they did.

They were a close-knit brotherhood, together for over 50 years. We were not their family. They did not have to let us in. But they did.

I am not the son of any powerful Hollywood insider, I was not from privileged stock. My family came from the working class immigrant waterfront of Brooklyn, and my father held down two jobs to feed his family. Why would such famous artists born and bred in California even bother to give me the time of day?

To master artists like Ollie & Frank, Maurice and Chuck, if you were in animation, and you were good and dedicated, then you were all right. You could be one of them. That was the most important single act of charity they did. They took us in, they taught us all the theory and tricks you still can’t find in books. We became more than just trainees or proteges. We became part of their extended family.

Because they did not want this special artform that they dedicated their lives to perfecting, to die out with them. Their last orders for us, their heirs, is to keep developing our artform and hand it off to the next generation as they took the time to teach us.

So it is with bittersweet emotion, we bid farewell to our Last Mentor, Ollie Johnston. One of the finest artists I have ever known. I hope we have justified your faith in us, that we have taken your lessons to heart.

As the French writer Montaigne said: What thou has been given as Tradition, take now as Task and make it your own.



Thank you Ollie!

Quiz: Okay, animation buffs, riddle me this..Who was Pinto Colvig?

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below: What is meant by Spartan living?
-------------------------------------------------------------
History for 8/20/2008
Birthdays: President Benjamin Harrison, H.P. Lovecraft, Art Tatum, Issac Hayes, Connie Chung, Jacqueline Susanne, Rajiv Ghandi, Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin- who co-wrote Stairway to Heaven, Joan Allen is 52, Fred Durst, Alan Reed -the original voice of Fred Flintstone, Amy Adams is 34



480 B.C. -THE THREE HUNDRED SPARTANS- When Persian King Xerxes invaded Greece the King of Sparta Leonidas decided the best place to try and stop him was in the narrow pass of Thermopylae. But the Spartan senate and other allied Greek states refused to send troops until they completed the Olympic religious festival. It was forbidden for Greeks to wage war during the Games. So Leonidas hurried ahead the 300 Spartans and a thousand more allied troops to try and stall ten times their number. After repulsing several attacks a traitor showed Xerxes a goat path around the Spartan position. Leonidas could still have retreated but he, his three hundred and some other Greek allies decided to stand and fight to the last man. They were wiped out, but they bought enough time for the Greeks eventual victory. Later a monument was erected over their bones: O xein angellin Lakdaimoniois hoti tede keimetha tois keinon rhemasi peithomenoi which means "Go Tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that True to their Command, Here We Lie."

1741-VITUS BERRING DISCOVERED ALASKA and helps colonize California. Well, he didn't actually help but for 200 years Spain had ignored it's Southwest colonies because there were no gold sodden Inca empires there. But when Berring opened the Pacific coast to Russian colonization the King of Spain freaked and ordered towns and missions built up the California coast. Britain also rushed it's claims to Washington State and British Columbia. This is why Juan DeCabrillo explored the California coast in 1542 but cities like L.A. and San Francisco weren't founded until 1770's.
Berring was a reluctant explorer. The Dane had heard Tsar Peter the Great was giving cushy salaries to skilled European sailors. But when Berring arrived in Russia the Tsar ordered him to travel 3700 miles to Siberia, build a fleet and explore the arctic because the Tsar had always wondered if America and Russia are connected. He went off and fooled around in the Arctic Sea for awhile then went back and said it wasn't. The Tsars scientists said that wasn't good enough, go back and do it again! Finally he discovered his Berring straights but died of scurvy in the Aleutians before he ever saw any money.

1882 -Peter Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" premiered in Moscow. The composer said of all his works the two pieces he liked the least were the 1812 Overture and the Nutcracker Suite. Overture 1812 was Richard Nixon’s favorite classical piece.

1896 – The Dial telephone patented. It was nicknamed the Gravediggers Dial because a funeral director invented it. It was the world standard until replaced by the touchtone button system in the 1980s. Even though the dial phone is a memory the words remain when we speak of "dialing up a number" or "dialing up someone’s website."

1940- In Mexico City exiled Russian leader Leon Trotsky was assassinated. While writing at his desk he hacked to death with a small mountainclimbers pick.. His murderer Ramon Mercador- alias Jules Antoine, alias Jackson was paid by Stalin's agents. He got into Trotsky's household by dating one of the maids. It was rumored that part of the Stalinist cell in Mexico was famed painter David Siquieros. Trotsky was having an affair with famed painter Frida Kahlo. Leon Trotsky predicted Stalin would try to get him while the world's attention was distracted by the Hitler War. When Mercador was released from a Mexican prison Stalin presented him with the Order of Lenin.

1940- In a radio speech Winston Churchill praised the efforts of the Royal Air Force in fighting Hitler's bombers-"Never have so Many, owed so Much, to so Few.'

1953- The Kinsey Report on Sexual Behavior in Women first published. Alfred & Clara Kinsey’s study proved to the conservative American public that 50% of women had premarital sex, liked sex for more than just procreation and 25% had a extramarital affair. This document following his 1948 report on sexual behavior of men revolutionized social attitudes towards sex and feminism.

1971- THE ENEMIES LIST. FBI documents prove this day the Nixon White House began to covertly investigate journalist Daniel Schorr because of his anti-war editorials. President Richard Nixon kept an enemies list of people he imagined to be opponents to his administration. It began with obvious liberals like George McGovern and Ted Kennedy, then expanded as far as June Foray the voice of Rocky the Flying Squirrel.

1972- Star Hollywood directors Francis Ford Coppola, Peter Bogdanovich and William Freidkin announced a partnership in a new production company called "The Director's Company" Young punks Martin Scorcese, George Lucas and Steven Speilberg were also involved. The partnership lasted two years then collapsed.

1977- NASA launched the Voyager One probe towards the outer planets of our solar system. Among the things Voyager discovered was that Jupiter had many more moons than previously thought and had a ring like Saturn. Part of Nasas' program was an explanatory simulation film done totally on computer by Jim Blinn. The animation was so smooth and the graphics so breathtaking it expanded the use of the c.g.i. medium and inspired a new generation of digital artists.

1982- Ralph Bakshi's film Hey Good Lookin'.

1985- Israel shipped 96 American-made TOW shoulder held missiles to the Ayatollahs in Iran. This was part of the Iran-Contra scheme. When Congress had forbidden the Ronald Reagan White House to send them any money to Anti-Communist rebels in Nicaragua, Reagan’s West Wing cooked up this scheme to trade arms for secret funds. Irans’ cash payment for the missiles went to the Nicaraguan Contra-Rebels.

1989- George and Joy Adamson, the naturalists who inspired the book Born Free, were murdered by Somali poachers in Kampi Ya Simba, Africa.

1991- Russian President Boris Yeltsin climbed onto a tank in front of the Russian Parliament and yells:" Come an get me!" Communist hardliner's attempt to regain power eventually fails.

1998- THE WAG THE DOG ATTACKS- After the Al Qaeda terrorist organization bombed US embassies in Africa the Bill Clinton administration looked for an opportunity to hit back. This day the CIA got word that senior Al Qaeda leaders including Osama Ben Laden were going to gather in a remote Afghan camp for a meeting. President Clinton ordered a spread of cruise missiles launched to kill them. The missiles hit their target but Ben Laden got away. In Washington the hostile Neo-Con media had a field day accusing the Clinton White House of making the strikes only to distract public attention from the Monica Lewinsky Sex Scandal. It alluded to a popular movie out at the time called Wag the Dog, where a scandal ridden president rigs a fake crisis to distract attention. Bill Clinton was stymied in any further efforts, and Osama Ben Laden lived on to plan 9-11.

1999- Planet Hollywood, the theme restaurant started by movie stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis and Demi Moore filed for bankruptcy.
---------------------------------------------------------------
Yesterday’s Quiz: What is meant by Spartan living?

Answer: The Greek city state of Sparta built their society around the laws of the statesman Lycurgus (est 650BC). They created a warrior society where women and men ate separately at communal tables with no luxuries and used iron bars for currency instead of gold, Boys from age 7 were given brutal military exercises to harden them, and become soldiers. They ate little but black broth, spring water and rough bread. This Draconian code created no poets or artists, but the finest soldiers in the world. Sparta came to defeat rival Athens and dominate the Greek world for awhile. By Roman times Sparta had devolved into a curious theme park to visit for losing weight. Kind of an ancient boot-camp diet.

Since then, to call a lifestyle Spartan means to live without luxuries or comfort with the barest of necessities.

I spent a nice day working on a mural for a friend's gym in North Hollywood. He didn't hire me. I just saw this nice big wall and decided it needs a picture on it. Funny, how after all the animating on Cintiqs, planning complex shows, studio politics, and retakes.....sometimes it's fun to just paint funny pictures on someones big white wall. It reminds you, as an artist, that at base you have a gift that can make people smile. And at times, that is what it is all about.

--------------------------------------------------------
Quiz: What is meant by Spartan living?

Yesterday’s Quiz Answered Below: In Walt Disney’s film of Alice in Wonderland, the portrayal of the Queen of Hearts was based on a real life person. Who was it?
---------------------------------------------------------------------
History for 8/19/2008
B-Days: Orville Wright, Ring Lardner, Ogden Nash, Alfred Lunt,jockey Willie Shoemaker, Malcom Forbes, Tipper Gore, Gene Roddenberry, Colleen Moore the It Girl, Jill St. John, Ginger Baker of Grand Funk Railroad, Dawn Steel, John Stamos, Peter Gallagher, former President Bill Clinton is 62

480 B.C. THERMOPYLAE- The Spartan King Leonidas had gone on ahead of other Greek allies to try and slow down the gigantic Persian invasion force of Xerxes. He chose to stop them at a narrow mountain pass in Thessaly called Thermopylae or Hot Gates. He had only 300 Spartans of his royal guard and 7000 other Greek allies to fight off 200,000 Persians. After repulsing several attacks this night spies told Leonidas a Greek traitor named Ephialtes had shown Xerxes a way around his position. If he did not retreat tomorrow he would be surrounded. Their seer Meistias saw nothing but death foretold in the sacrificial entrails.
But Leonidas decided the best way to gain time and create an example for Greece to rally was to stay and fight to the end. He allowed his allies to withdraw but 1500 warriors including his 300 Spartans stayed with him. Meistias sent away his only son to be saved but he stayed to fight. This night before the last battle the Spartans spent most of their time combing and oiling their hair and beards, for they did not want to enter the next life looking shabby. One Spartan warrior named Dieneces was told when the Persian multitudes fire their arrows they black out the sun. Dieneces replied: “Good, then we can fight them in the shade.”

Before we attack, I need to do another series on my abs, Grrrrr!

14 A.D.- Elderly Emperor Augustus died after ruling the Roman Empire for 44 years. The Empress Livia had ordered the imperial villa surrounded with troops so no one but her saw his end. She said his last words were:" Have I played my part well in this great comedy called life?" But the historian Tacitus suspected Livia might have aided his shuffling off this mortal coil before he had second thoughts about leaving the empire to her son Tiberius, He may have said something more like: " Honey, I don't feel so good. What did you put in these figs?"

1274- King Edward Ist Longshanks and his Queen Eleanor of Castile crowned at Westminister Abbey. Edward was called Long-Legs because he was over 6 foot, and his constant wars and blood conquest earned him nicknames like The Hammer of the Scots, the Great Plantagenet and Big Baddass In-Your-Face Mofo King.

1399 - King Richard II of England surrendered his throne to his cousin Henry Bollingbroke, who became King Henry IV. Richard II is not remembered for much else but inventing the pocket-handkerchief.

1599- Spanish Conquistadors capture and burn Acoma pueblo in New Mexico east of modern Alberquergue. The Indian village on the sheer tabletop mountain reminded the Spaniards of attacking castles back home. After their victory they enslaved the population and burned the chief at the stake as a heretic. As the chief was roasting the monk Diego Las Casas started to feel guilty, so he urged the chief at his last moments to accept baptism. The chief called out through the flames:"No thank you, because then I would go to the Christian Heaven and meet even MORE of you people!"

1692- Salem Mass, The pilgrims executed four women as witches. One was an elderly senile woman who just looked scarey like a witch, and another was a Caribbean servant named Tituba who liked to entertain children by telling ghost stories.

1745- THE GATHERING OF THE CLANS- At Glenfinnin in the Scottish Highlands to the thunder of drums and the skirl of massed bagpipes, Bonnie Prince Charlie raised his banner of revolt and called all Scottish clans to rally to him. Many clans stayed aloof but Clan MacDonald and Cameron wholeheartedly swelled his ranks as did his family clan the Stuarts.

1781- George Washington starts his continental army marching from Yonkers, New York to attack Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown Virginia. At Dobbs Ferry he started ferrying his troops across the Great Northern River as the Hudson was known then. He was amazed that the British army only twenty miles away in New York City never stirred to attack him. Washington’s minutemen at this time were so broke that the French General the Comte du Rocheambeau donated some of his own money to pay them some wages.

1812-OLD IRONSIDES- During the war of 1812 The USS Constitution pounded it out with the frigate HMS Guerriere off the coast of Nova Scotia. The British captain complained his cannonballs bounced harmlessly off the Constitutions heavy New Hampshire oak hull as though it was made of iron. The nickname stuck and today Old Ironsides is the oldest commissioned ship in the US Navy.

1814-THE ATTACK ON WASHINGTON BEGAN. A huge British battle fleet of 14 Ships of the Line landed an invasion force of veteran redcoat troops at the town of Benedict on the Pautuxent River in Virginia. Admirals Cochrane & Cockburn’s intent was to march on Washington D.C., and “give the Americans a Good Drubbing!” The defenses of the American capitol were some militia and a few Marines from the two armed schooners hiding in the shallows of the Cheasapeake. U.S. Secretary of War Armstrong was convinced they were faking and the real target of the British was Baltimore. President James Madison sent contradicting orders to Armstrong and the field generals. Secretary of State James Monroe personally galloped about alone under British fire bringing the only reliable scouting reports.

1955 - WINS radio, announces it will not play "copy" white cover versions of black R&B . DJs must play Fats Domino's "Ain't It A Shame," not Pat Boone's. In 1957 Little Richards “Tuttie-Fruitie” never got higher than 17th in the Billboard Charts while Pat Boones version, by his own admission awful, went to number one.

1957- The NY Giants baseball team voted to move to San Francisco.

1973 - Kris Kristofferson wed Rita Coolidge.

1977- Groucho Marx , the last surviving Marx Brother, died at age 86. In his final years Groucho had rewrote his will in favor of his 31 year old personal secretary Erin Fleming. This spawned a furious legal battle between Fleming and the Marx family.

1989- The Polish Communist regime resigns and turns over power to the Solidarity trade union movement, the first Communist government to collapse.

1991-THE AUGUST COUP. Communist hardliners in a final attempt to stop the fall of the Soviet system try to overthrow leader Mikhail Gorbachov. They try to do it the way they did it to Nikita Khruschev in 1964, arresting Gorbachov while he was at his vacation dacha or cottage. The coup failed several days later when Russian Republic President Boris Yeltsin climbed on top of a tank and called for a "people-power" style rising to support the democratic elements of the government.

2000- Scientists report water at the North Pole for the first time in 50 million years. Today they are worrying about all the ice melting by next year.

2335 – According to Star Trek the Next Generation this is the birthday of William T Riker, in Valdez Alaska, first officer of the Enterprise.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Yesterday’s Quiz: In Walt Disney’s film of Alice in Wonderland, the portrayal of the Queen of Hearts was based on a real life person. Who was it?
courtesy of mouseplanet.com

Answer: Frank Thomas said they went to lunch once in Hollywood and saw gossip columnist Louella Parsons bullying around her staff. She was a squat thick lady with black hair and a large mouth. And the rest is...animation.
Here, check the resemblance for yourself-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NsclfwA4VsY

Quiz: In Disney’s film Alice in Wonderland, the portrayal of the Queen of Hearts was based on a real life person. Who was it?

Yesterday’s Question answered below: What is nomenclature?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
HISTORY FOR 8/18/2008
Birthdays: Meriwether Lewis ,Austrian Emperor Franz Josef II, Leo Slezak Shelly Winters, Caspar Weinburger, Roberto Clemente, Rafer Johnson, Enoch Light, Coco Channel, Roman Polanski is 75, Patrick Swayze is 56, Madeleine Stowe is 50, Christian Slater, Edward Norton is 39, Martin Mull, Denis Leary, Robert Redford, born Charles Robert Redford Jr, who first wanted to be an animator before turning to acting, is 72



1503-Pope Alexander VI, the Borgia, died. Some say he died of malaria, others that he poisoned himself accidentally while trying to poison someone else. The Borgia's enemies then take over the Vatican and end Caesar & Lucretia Borgia's reign of terror. The Pope had had seven children and at the time was sleeping with 16 year old Giulia Farnese whom he had painted as the Virgin Mary. People said the Alexander had sold his soul to the devil because at his death an ape appeared on his windowsill and water boiled in his mouth. Hmmm- proof enough for me. His 300 lb. corpse was so swollen with corruption that it had to be pounded into it's coffin with big wood wine-corking mallets.

1587- Virginia Dare, the first English child in America, is born. She was in the Roanoke Colony, the fabled "Lost Colony" who all disappeared a year later.

1850- Honore' Balzac died after drinking too much coffee. He was overweight, seldom bathed and picked his nose in public, but women still found him irresistible.

1856- Mr Gail Borden patents condensed milk. It became popular during the Civil War when it was used by the army, then it spawned the process food industry. When Borden died he left instructions that his tombstone be shaped like a milk can.

1862- THE GREAT SANTEE SIOUX UPRISING- Minnesota Sioux tribes called Dakota-Allies, had agreed to sell their land and settle on reservations and learn farming. Once removed from their land they starved waiting for food and money held up by government agents corruption. When Chief Little Crow -Taoyateduta demanded food he knew was being stockpiled in warehouses Indian Agent Andrew J. Myrick responded “Let your people eat grass!” This day the Sioux exploded across the prairie from New Ulm to Fort Snelling (Minneapolis)- 200 whites were killed, including Indian Agent Myrick, who was found with a tuft of grass stuffed in his mouth.

1872 - 1st mail-order catalog issued by A M Ward.

1896- 200 outlaws gather at Hole-In-The-Wall to form the "Wild Bunch".
They never went all at the same time to a heist, it was more like a gunfighters guild. I wonder what the dues were?

1919- Tennessee becomes the last state needed to ratify the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution giving women the vote. The legislature was deadlocked but the tie was broken by one state senator who changed his mind. He wanted to please his mother.

1937- The Toyota Automobile Company was established as an offshoot of the Toyoda Motorized Loom Works. They changed the name Toyoda to Toyota because a Shinto priest told them the name would be luckier.

1939- The movie the Wizard of Oz released and made a star of Judy Garland. Frank Morgan, ther actor playing the Wizard, needed to wear a shabby old coat so a studio costume designer went through some L.A. thrift stores until she found the good candidate. When Morgan looked in the lining he discovered the coat was previously owned by L.Frank Baum, writer of the Oz stories. Morgan was first president of the Screen Actor's Guild, but stepped down when he was considered 'too left' to work with the Roosevelt administration. Lyricist Yip Harburg ( Somewhere over the Rainbow ) was later blacklisted as a communist. "And yer little dog ,too!!"

1950- Battle of the Bowling Alley- The US and South Korean Armies pushed up against the Pusan Perimeter score their first victory against North Korean regulars. It got it’s name because the North Korean tanks bottled up into narrow defiles by the land made excellent targets for waiting anti-tank artillery, bazooka and aircraft. Eyewitnesses said it looked like a “Bowling Alley in Hell.”

1953- The first MacDonalds Franchise restaurant opened in Downey California.

1956- Actress Vivien Leigh suffered a mental breakdown after a miscarriage.

1958 - "Lolita," by Vladimir Nabokov, published. The novel was rejected by four publishers before Putnams picked it up. It became a best seller and allowed Nabokov to quit teaching and focus on writing.

1958 - TV game show scandal investigation starts. Allegations that popular quiz shows like 21 were rigged turned out to be true.

1962 - Peter, Paul & Mary release their 1st hit "If I Had a Hammer"

1966- HAPPY BIRTHDAY SLURPEE! The Ice Slurpee was invented by two Dallas engineers for a failing Oklahoma ice cream store.

1977- The Xerox Company decided not to seriously market the Alto, the pioneering personal computer that had a graphic window interface and mouse long before anyone else. Xerox decided to stick with copying machines and disbanded their Palo Alto development team Xerox PARC. Most of their breakthroughs wound up in other computers like the Macintosh II and the IBM PC.



1977- The rock band the Police make their debut in a Birmingham nightclub. The lead singer Gordon Sumner started to get the nickname Sting from the black and yellow shirt he habitually wore.

1986 - John Tesh's first appearance on Entertainment Tonight.

1989- Publishing Tycoon Malcolm Forbes flies 800 guests to Tangiers to celebrate his birthday. His birthday party cost $2 million. The soiree' comes to symbolize 1980's wealthy excess.

1999- TV psychic Kriswell predicted TODAY would be the End of the World.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Yesterday’s Question: What is nomenclature?

Answer: Nomenclature today means the assigning a classification to a particular grouping of objects like elements. It is from the Nomenclatura, an ancient Roman personal slave who acted as a personal data base for his master. The Nomenclatura memorized thousand of names, business contacts and details, and could provide them at the snap of his master's finger. I wonder if one was named Marcus Licinius Wickapedium?