More Advice from the Old Masters-



Shamus Culhane (1908-1996) once sat me on his lap, took the Bourbon out of my hand, and told me- The biggest animation studio is two flops from disaster. One flop and they say- okay, we'll learn from this. But after the second flop, when you hear " We have to re-evaluate.." It means time to get your portfolio up to date."


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Birthdays: Harriet Beecher Stowe, W.B.Yeats, Red Grange, Basil Rathbone, Dorothy Sayers, Ralph Edwards, Tim Allen, Darla Hood, Malcom McDowell, Ally Sheedy, Simon Callow, Joe Roth, Christo, Paul Lynde-he of the Hollywood Squares and that utterly memorable TV show Dastardley and Mutley and their Flying Machines

1905- The workers of the Russian city of Odessa go on strike and the Tsar's troops shoot them down on the Odessa steps. This causes the Battleship Potemkin's sailors to mutiney. Twenty years later Sergei Eisenstein to make a famous film of the same name. Unlike the film the crew of the Potemkin didn't start a revolution, they just sailed their ship to Romania and asked for asylum.


1920-The US Government rules Americans cannot mail their children through the Parcel Post System.

1927- Wall St. tickertape parade for Lucky Lindy- Charles Lindbergh.

1941-The American Federation of Labor the AF of L called for a nationwide boycott of all Disney products and films. This was to support the Disney Cartoonists strike.

1942- President Roosevelt by executive order created the Office of Strategic Services or the OSS. Under director Wild Bill Donovan its job was to coordinate espionage and intelligence gathering against the Axis powers in cooperation with its British counterpart , the SOE. On the agencies personnel roster were experts from spymasters Bill Gates and William Casey to tourist book author Eugene Fodor and chef Julia Child. Child recalled the outfit was nicknamed “Oh So Secret!” and “Oh, So-Social” for all the society notables in it. After World War Two the OSS transformed into the CIA.

1958- rock & roll great Frank Zappa graduated Antelope Valley High School.

1978- Henry Ford II fired Lee Iacocca from the Ford Corporation. The creator of the Ford Mustang would later move on to run Chrysler. When asked why Ford said: “Sometimes you just don’t like somebody.”