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The Milestone Mo-Tel today. Winners get one
free night. Losers get two. (That's the second
time we've used that joke today.) |
If the whole world loves a winner, we have a weekend full of love ahead of us. Let's get started!
The most obvious winners will be declared Thursday when either Clint Robertson or Brandy Kuentzel wins the right to become Donald Trump's latest Apprentice for one year. (We hope that the loser isn't stuck for two years ...) One of the three remaining teams on "The Amazing Race" will win a million smackers on Sunday. (Perhaps eating that sheep's head may have been worth it.) It's almost guaranteed that none of these winners will make Barbara Walters' list of the year's "Most Fascinating People," (most fascinating to her, anyway ...) but we’ll find out for sure Thursday. (Our guess for #1 on her list? The cameraman who smears the Vaseline all over the lens that photographs her.) And on Friday, they'll be handing out the Nobel Prizes. The Nobels aren't like the Oscars; everyone already knows who won and the winners have actually accomplished something that matters, rather than playing loveable oddballs.
Saturday we'll see some sports winners. In the afternoon, someone (Cam Newton? Andrew Luck? LaMichael James?) will win the Heisman Trophy as the nation's finest college football player, and in the evening, either Georges St-Pierre or Josh Koscheck will take the welterweight championship at UFC 124 in Montreal. We assume the combatants will not resort to wheeling around the ring in roller skates, but while it would be appropriate (given that Thursday marks the anniversary of their 1884 patent), we'd have to warn them that such a thing would be just plain dangerous.)
Sunday also marks the 10th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Bush v. Gore, which ensured that George W. Bush became the nation's 43rd president. Whether that made the country a winner or a loser, we'll leave up to you. Falling into a similar category is Larry King's retirement from his CNN talk show on Friday. (As with President Bush, we won't say whether that's a plus or a minus.)
Weary travelers were winners 85 years ago Sunday, when the Milestone Mo-Tel, the world's first motel (short for "motor hotel"), opened in San Luis Obispo, California.
If we stretch the definition of "winner" to include those whose birthdays fall this weekend, then we're lousy with winners. For example, Thursday sees the birthdays of both Margaret Hamilton (1902) and Redd Foxx (1922). Hamilton is best known for her role as the Wicked Witch of the West in the 1939 classic, "The Wizard of Oz." Despite her indelible portrayal of one of the screen's great villains, Hamilton loved children and was a lifelong advocate for charities that benefitted kids and animals. Foxx was someone whose work, on the other hand, was decidedly not for kids. A veteran of the black vaudeville entertainment venues known as the "Chitlin' Circuit," Foxx recorded a series of "party records" in the 1950s that were both filthy and hilarious. He reached a mainstream fame in the '70s when he starred in "Sanford and Son," where his frequent feigned heart attacks were one of the show's running gags. In a supreme irony, he suffered an actual heart attack while rehearsing for another television show, but no one believed was it real until it was too late.
Sunday would have been the 95th birthday of Frank Sinatra. The greatest popular singer of the 20th century, Sinatra was also an Oscar-winning actor, starred in numerous TV specials that consisted of nothing but him singing with his guests, and was the biggest attraction in Las Vegas when that title actually meant something.
Monday, we celebrate the 192nd birthday of Mary Todd Lincoln, wife of Abraham Lincoln who was criticized in her time for her extravagant and spendthrift ways, and committed to a psychiatric hospital by her son Robert. While she was undoubtedly depressed, wouldn't any woman who’d lived through the death of three sons and the murder of her husband (while sitting next to him) feel the same? She was eventually declared competent and released, but her health was broken, and she died three years later.
If birthday celebrants are winners, so too are those is show business who meet success, like performers and lovers of country music, who can celebrate the 83rd anniversary of the first broadcast of the Grand Ole Opry on Friday. The Opry has been a staple of radio and television in the decades since it debuted, highlighting the best in country, from Hank Williams and Minnie Pearl to Clint Black and Carrie Underwood. Someone who's appeared at the Opry (but has yet to be inducted into its member ranks) is Taylor Swift. Perhaps the Opry has been waiting for her to turn 21 - in which case, it need wait no longer! The Grammy-winning singer reaches her majority on Monday.
Thursday will see the annual airing of the Rankin-Bass animated Christmas special, "The Year without a Santa Claus," which features memorable turns by Snow Miser and Heat Miser (who are also not members of the Opry).
Friday is also the 55th anniversary of the "Mighty Mouse Playhouse's" television premiere. In TV's early days, broadcasters were desperate for material to air, so old movies and cartoons were natural fodder, and Paul Terry's "Mighty Mouse" cartoons were some of the oddest programs to come to the screen. Mini operatic melodramas, they featured the eponymous rodent singing his was through battles with the villainous Oil Can Harry. Mighty made a brief comeback in the 80s in a brilliant TV series produced by Ralph Bakshi, but he's been in retirement since self-appointed censor Donald Wildmon mistook the mouse's flower sniffing for drug use. (No, really.) Wildmon isn't the only well-intentioned, if-misguided, protector we mention, though, since Thursday is the anniversary of the founding of the John Birch Society, which has been protecting Americans from the Communists lurking under their beds for 52 years.
Legitimate do-gooders have something to celebrate this weekend, too. Thursday is the U.N's annual International Anti-Corruption Day, dedicated to wiping out, well, corruption and promoting the rule of law, and Friday is both Human Rights Day and the beginning of Human Rights Week.
We end by noting a delightful juxtaposition on Thursday. December 9, 1792, saw the first cremation in America, when statesman Henry Laurens died at his plantation in Charleston, South Carolina, and per his will, his body was burned. On the same date in 1886, Clarence Birdseye, inventor of frozen food was born. We're reminded of the choice Curly Howard was given in a Three Stooges short: to be burned at the stake or to have his head cut off. He opted for the former, on the reasoning that a hot stake's better than a cold chop. Good night!
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Goodnight to the creature
who swims in the lake.
Goodnight to the killjoys
who think she's a fake. |
Thursday, we noted the anniversary of Route 66, and until the federal government decommissioned it, the various highway departments in the states through which the road ran kept it in good shape. Not every such department is as fastidious, though. For example, there's the Oregon Highway Division, which on November 12, 1970, decided that the best way to destroy a rotting sperm whale that had beached itself before dying was to blow it up, an incident which led to one the greatest memes in Internet history: "the exploding whale."
While the whale parts made for a gloppy, smelly mess, the resulting patterns might well have resembled a masterpiece by Sunday's birthday boy, Claude Monet. Born in 1840, Monet was part of the revolutionary school of painting (taking its name - "Impressionism" – from of one of Monet's pictures) that was notable for depicting the effects of light on objects and places and making unique personal statements through their canvases.
Friday must be a day for creatures. In 1933, Hugh Gray took the first known photos of the Loch Ness Monster in Scotland. While some deny the existence of "Nessie," we are convinced she is alive and well.
Not so benign a creature was Joseph McCarthy, the senator who took paranoia, ignorance, and character assassination to new heights. Sunday would have marked his 102nd birthday. McCarthy was, by all accounts, an unpleasant man, and through his unceasing attempts to smear anyone who opposed him as a Communist, he managed to give his name to both an era and a political tactic. Censured by the Senate in 1954 for his actions, he eventually drank himself to death in 1957.
Almost as unpleasant as Sen. McCarthy is Yanni, the New Age musician whose calming tunes are as soporific as the situation comedies of Sherwood Schwartz. Both men celebrate their birthdays on Sunday, so perhaps Mr. Schwartz (responsible for such sitcoms as The Brady Bunch" and "Gilligan's Island") and Mr. Hrysomallis (Yanni's real name) will spend the night before their 94th and 56th birthdays, respectively, watching something more energetic, like UFC 122. (The idea of Yanni screaming himself hoarse over wrestlers is pretty delicious.)
Of course, it's possible that the men might celebrate with a trip, though we wouldn't suggest one as energetic as that begun on November 14, 1889, when pioneering female journalist Nellie Bly (aka Elizabeth Cochrane) began her successful attempt to travel around the world in fewer than 80 days, in emulation of Jules Verne's Phileas Fogg. Nellie completed the trip in a mere 72 days. An appropriate feat this week especially, as National Geography Awareness Week begins on Sunday.
Newspapers around the world covered Nellie's trip, but the BBC couldn't have - because it didn't exist. The venerable network begin its radio service in 1922, some 33 years after her voyage. They've made up for it in the decades since with continuous news and entertainment.
One of the stories we're sure they covered was the marriage of actress Carmen Electra and basketball player Dennis Rodman, wed in Las Vegas (where else?) in 1998. Unfortunately, the happy couple couldn't make a go of it, and they were divorced four-and-a-half months later.
Something else that couldn't last (in spite of surviving about 500 years) was the Inca Empire, which saw the beginning of its end in 1533, when Francisco Pizarro's Spanish conquistadors arrived in Cajamarca, Peru, to show the natives who the new bosses were - a feat not unlike that performed by single women upon single men on Sadie Hawkins Day, which debuted in Al Capp's comic strip, "Li'l Abner" in 1937. Sadie Hawkins was the "homeliest gal" in Abner's hometown of Dogpatch. When she turned 35, her father declared that there would be a race with all the town's unmarried men being pursued by its unamrried women. Any bachelor who was caught was doomed to matrimony.
We end the week by noting that Saturday is World Kindness Day, and noting the 1952 death of a woman who must have been one of the kindest people ever: Margaret Wise Brown. Brown was a writer of children's books, who, in collaboration with such artists as Clement Hurd, turned out such classics as "Goodnight, Moon" and "The Runaway Bunny," which have calmed and enriched the bedtimes of millions of children.
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"Curse you, King Tut!" |
Thursday:
We trade in coincidence again today. For example, it's the birthdays of two of the most beloved and trusted men in American history: Will Rogers (1879) and Walter Cronkite (1916). Rogers began his show business career as a vaudevillian, performing rope tricks that were soon combined with pithy comments on the day's events. He became so popular that he was signed by producer Florenz Ziegfeld to be one of the stars of his annual "Follies." A film career followed, as did a national newspaper column and radio programs, where his opinions were noted for the common-sense truths behind the quips. When he was killed in an Alaskan plane crash in 1935, the nation went into mourning. His hometown of Claremore, Oklahoma, still celebrates him at its annual "Will Rogers Days," which begin today and continue through Saturday.
Cronkite began working on newspapers in high school, and translated his print journalism skills onto radio in the mid 1930s. During World War II, he served as a correspondent for the United Press, often reporting from combat zones. In 1950, he joined the news staff at CBS, and in 1962, became the managing editor and anchorman for the "CBS Evening News," where his unbiased and in-depth reporting of the day’s events won him the title of the "Most Trusted Man in America."
But that's not our only birthday coincidence. On this day in 1946, both Robert Mapplethorpe and Laura Bush were born – and it's hard to imagine two people who could be less alike. Mapplethorpe was a photographer who tried to find art and beauty in the obscene. While his works were condemned for their frank sexual content, it was (and is) hard to deny the beauty of their composition and execution. Laura Bush is the former first lady, who despite the many polarizing opinions her husband's administration sparked, was generally respected for her championship of children's health, education, and literacy. It would be hard to imagine two people less likely to be in the same room blowing out candles on a birthday cake, though.
And tomorrow will mark the 47th birthdays of actors Andrea McArdle and Tatum O'Neal, two women who, despite their starts at child actors, took differing career paths. O'Neal began acting early, turning in an Oscar-winning performance in "Paper Moon" by the age of 10. It's been mostly downhill for her since, though, as she's lived through a busted marriage and various addictions. She still acts, but not at the level she once promised. McArdle also began at the top, when at the age of 14, she was pulled from the chorus to star in the original production of the Broadway musical "Annie" (losing the Tony Award to her co-star Dorothy Louden, who played Annie's nemesis, Miss Hannigan). In the years since, she's worked on- and off-Broadway, touring the country in numerous musicals and plays (and is even currently playing Miss Hannigan in Long Beach, California).
We’re not through, though. Thursday is King Tut Day, commemorating the 1922 discovery of the lost tomb of the Pharaoh Tutankhamen by Egyptologist Howard Carter. The tomb itself was supposed to be cursed, meaning that all who dared to enter it would die horrible deaths, but of the 58 people who were present at the tomb's opening, only eight had died by 1934 – and Carter himself lived until 1939. So much for that "coincidence."
Finally, it's National Candy Day, and if you overindulge, you're likely to meet your dentist – not so coincidentally.
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This is a good start for a sandwich,
but is really only the beginning.
(Photo by Cindy Funk)
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Tuesday:
Today is Election Day, and we encourage you to get out and vote for (or against) the candidate of your choice. After the polls close, you can tune into the results and see if you'll spend the next couple of years elated or bitterly disappointed. In a nice coincidence, this is also the 90th anniversary of Pittsburgh radio station KDKA making the world’s first commercial broadcast, which just happened to be the results of the 1920 Presidential election.
One activity we don't encourage today is going down to your local polling place and cheerleading for your favorite politicians or ballot initiatives. Leave those activities to those who are trained to do it, like one Johnny Campbell, who became the world's first cheerleader, as he led the crowd to cheer on the University of Minnesota football team.
One guy who never needed cheerleading or encouragement was Howard Hughes. Hughes was the fabulously wealthy engineer and aviator who was dedicated to breaking new ground in aviation technology, never moreso than in 1947, when he piloted his H-4 Hercules (aka "The Spruce Goose") on its one and only flight over Long Beach harbor in California. The Hercules is still one of the largest planes ever built (with a wingspan of 320 feet) and currently resides in a museum in McMinnville, Oregon.
Someone who could have used a cheerleader was Charles Van Doren. Van Doren caused a national sensation in the 1950s when he appeared on the game show "Twenty One," winning a still-impressive $129,000. The victory was tainted, though, for on this day in 1959, Van Doren admitted that he had been given his questions – and answers – in advance.
Wednesday:
All other events take a back seat to National Sandwich Day today. Is there anything better than a tasty sandwich? We think not. Why celebrate the sandwich today? Because it's the 292nd birthday of John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, the alleged inventor of the meal in itself. Whether the legend is true or not, we're thankful for it, as there are few better meals.
The only thing that could possibly top the world's greatest meal is its most famous painting, the Mona Lisa. On this date in 1507, Leonardo da Vinci was hired by Francesco del Giocondo to paint the portrait of his wife Lisa Gherardini. The resulting picture has been familiarly known as the "Mona Lisa" ever since. Beyond that and the lady's smile, we don't know much about the enigmatic painting – though some folks certainly have their own ideas.
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| BOO! | By Dave Sikula
Mon, October 25, 2010, 12:01 am PDT |
It's not enough that he has to
hang from a broken ankle; he
also has to hold his breath for
three minutes and get out of
a locked cage.That's scary.
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Even though this week is dominated by the spooky holiday at the end of it, let's see what's happening between now and then.
Monday:
We'll start with artists, in particular two who couldn't have been more different. In 1881, Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso, better known as just Picasso - was born in Malaga, Spain. In 1907, the flat perspectives and angular bodies of his "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon" - hit the art world like a bomb, and signaled the birth of cubism. Over the next 66 years, Picasso's creativity and originality were unrivaled, as he produced some 50,000 works and became the most famous artist in the world. (And, as a bonus, dressing as one of his canvases would make a fine Halloween costume.)
On the other hand, we have Roy Lichtenstein, whose 87th birthday falls on Wednesday. In the early 1960s, Lichtenstein started copying panels from comic books, plagiarizing the original work of such (better) artists as Jack Kirby, Russ Heath, Tony Abruzzo, Irv Novick, and Jerry Grandenetti, rarely, if ever, giving the original artists credit - or any of the huge fees he collected.
Thinking of more pleasant topics, we turn to leaf peeping, and remind you that we’re at the peak of the fall foliage season. Throughout the northern latitudes - especially in New England - tourists and natives are driving through the countryside watching leaves die and turn eye-popping shades of yellow, gold, and red. It seems like magic, which is appropriate, given that this is International Magic Week.
Speaking of magic, tonight is the Broadway premiere of Alfred Uhry's play "Driving Miss Daisy," starring James Earl Jones, Vanessa Redgrave, and Boyd Gaines. Seems odd that a 23-year old play that spawned an Oscar-winning film has never appeared on Broadway, but that's showbiz.
Jones and Redgrave are huge stars, but it's the birthday of one of the smallest: Billy Barty, born on this day in 1924. Barty was born with a form of dwarfism called cartilage-hair hypoplasia and stopped growing at 3'9". He started working in movies at the age of three, almost always playing a baby while still well into his teens, but in his adult years, he was a tireless worker for the rights of little people - and turned in a series of fine performances in such films as "The Day of the Locust" and "Foul Play."
Tuesday:
Today is the anniversary of the 1881 "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" in Tombstone, Arizona. While the fight itself didn't actually take place in the corral, lasted only 30 seconds (although approximately 30 shots were fired in that time), and was essentially the result of a feud between the Earp and Clanton families, it's probably the most famous gunfight in Western history. It's the centerpiece of at least seven movies, and numerous television shows and novels.
We also note a number of debuts today. First is the 1982 premiere of "St. Elsewhere." "St. Elsewhere" was one of the most innovative television series in history; it combined gripping medical drama with in-jokes, bizarre plot twists, and possibly the most notorious finale in TV history, when it revealed that the show's entire six year run had been the imaginings of an autistic teenager. That said, it remains at the center of all television series, as the "Tommy Westphall Universe" theory posits that "90 percent of all television took place in Tommy Westphall's mind."
While we can't be certain that the "Back to the Future" trilogy takes place in Tommy's mind, we can be sure that, in the wake of Michael J. Fox's recent reappearance as Marty McFly, all three movies are making their Blu-Ray appearance today.
In the world of sports, the NBA season opens tonight. We'll be turning our attentions to Boston, where the traitorous LeBron James will be playing his first official game with the Miami Heat against the even-more-evil Celtics. We'll also be looking toward the Staples Center, where your world champion Los Angeles Lakers will be receiving their championship rings before hosting the Houston Rockets.
If that's too much basketball for you, you might consider a trip to Secaucus, New Jersey for a taste of Jewish culture at Kosherfest. (We assume the meat and dairy exhibits are kept in separate halls.)
Wednesday:
If Secaucus is just too darn far to travel, we suggest you snuggle up at home with a spud and some suds to commemorate both National Potato Day and American Beer Day, all while watching game one of the 2010 World Series, which begins tonight as the Texas Rangers travel to San Francisco's AT&T Park.
Thursday and Friday:
One team will win the Series and one will lose, but other winners and losers dominate the next two days.
In the former column, we find Edith Head, born on October 28, 1897. Head was the Hollywood costume designer par excellence, designing wardrobes for over 400 films, garnering 35 Oscar nominations and eight awards. But Ms. Head isn't our only winner today. The American people scored a win in 1886, when the Statue of Liberty was unveiled on what had been Bedloe’s Island, but has been called "Liberty Island" ever since.
Another winner is "The Sound of Music," the 1965 mega-musical that is (bafflingly to us) still staggeringly popular. In fact, adjusted for inflation, it’s still the third highest-grossing film of all time, having taken in the equivalent of more than $1.13 billion. So popular is it, in fact, that the cast will appear on Oprah Winfrey's show on Friday for a 45th anniversary reunion - including co-star Christopher Plummer, whose disparagement of the film as "The Sound of Mucous" is legendary.
Sort of stuck between "winner" and "loser" was Anton LaVey, who died October 29, 1997. LaVey was a writer and occultist who founded the Church of Satan, but the Church itself was less about "devil worship" than about the material world and the individual. We assume Mr. LaVey left plans for a suitable funeral, but, regardless, Saturday will be your own chance to think ahead, as it's Create a Great Funeral Day.
Firmly in the "loss" column is the tragedy that occurred due to the crash of the stock market on October 29, 1929, an event that plunged the planet into a Great Depression that only a world war was able to remedy.
Saturday:
The day before All-Hallow's Eve (aka "Devil's Night") gives us plenty of opportunities to celebrate. For example, it's the 72nd anniversary of Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre's radio adaptation of H. G. Wells' "The War of the Worlds," a broadcast that scared the pants off a good portion of the country. Many who tuned in late became convinced that Martians had indeed invaded Earth and the end of the world was nigh. Given that Welles was famous for his ballyhoo, we wonder how much of the panic was hoped-for.
Speaking of fear, we know we'll be glued to the tube this morning to watch Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert hold their "Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear" on the National Mall in Washington. (And we'll finish the day by tuning into "Saturday Night Live" to watch Jon Hamm return once more to his hosting duties.)
Of course, the most terrifying prospect (unless you're a dentist) is the thought of all that candy tomorrow, accompanied by the prospect of toddlers hopped up on sugar. The antidote for this is a candy so horrid that no one would actually eat it. While the best solution is the worst of all candies (circus peanuts), the sweet in the number two position gets its turn in the spotlight today, National Candy Corn Day. Buy a big bag of the vile stuff and your kids will be begging for healthier treats.
Sunday:
Today is Halloween, which overshadows everything else, but there's still plenty more of interest.
For example, the San Francisco 49ers will take on the Denver Broncos in London's venerable Wembley Stadium to demonstrate American football to the Brits one more time. (Though the way the Niners have been playing so far this season, it could turn Wembley into a chamber of horrors.)
And since the dead will walk tomorrow, we note the anniversary of the body of the late Soviet leader Josef Stalin being moved in 1961 from its premium spot beside the preserved corpse of Lenin.
Two of our own personal favorites passed in this day. In 1925, French silent film comedian Max Linder committed suicide with his wife. At his peak in the 1910s, Linder was almost as famous and as popular as Charlie Chaplin. He turned out a series of droll comedies that contrasted with the adventures of Chaplin's "tramp" character by portraying a sharp urban sophisticate. Unfortunately, Linder's film career was interrupted by World War I, and the subsequent health and mental problems he suffered from his service led to his death.
On this day the following year, Harry Houdini died. Houdini was one of the greatest showmen of the Golden Age of Magic. While not the most skilled magician, he was unparalleled in giving his audience a full evening's entertainment, which included magic, escapes, and the exposure of fraudulent mediums. During his last week, Houdini suffered from appendicitis and fractured his ankle (and still performed his "Chinese Water Torture Cell" escape, which involved being suspended by his ankles) and Despite a temperature of 104ºF and intense pain, he refused to be hospitalized until he collapsed on stage (and even then, he finished the show). After a week in Detroit's Grace Hospital, he died of peritonitis brought on by his ruptured appendix.
Somewhere between horror and entertainment lies the musical "The Scottsboro Boys," which opens on Broadway tonight. One of the final collaborations between writers John Kander and Fred Ebb (the latter of whom actually died in 2004), the musical tells the story of nine black Alabama teenagers who were unjustly accused of raping two white women in 1931. The case became a cause célèbre, sparking years of trials, appeals, retrials, and Supreme Court rulings, ultimately ending in a series of convictions, pardons, and acquittals.
After all that death and destruction, let's end the week on some lighter notes. For example, Halloween 1941 saw the completion of the sculpting of the faces on Mt. Rushmore. And today, in addition to being Halloween, is also, appropriately enough, National Knock-Knock Day, dedicated not only to those first jokes many of us learned, but also to the kids who'll be knocking on your door tonight - some of whom may well be collecting for UNICEF, since this is National UNICEF Day.
See you in November!
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