Saturday, September 24, 2011

Happy Birthday Jim

To celebrate the late Jim Henson's 75th birthday, today Google has created a great Google Doodle for the day



Check it out


September 24, 1991 -
Nirvana's album Nevermind was released 20 years today.



At this point Teen Spirit is still smelling fairly strong indeed.


September 24, 1938 -
This cartoon set the bar for outlandishness in animation - Porky in Wackyland was released on this date.



Watch it a few times to really get everything that's going on in this one.


September 24, 1945 -
Michael Curtiz' tense film noir, sometimes mislabelled as a 'women's picture', Mildred Pierce, was released on this date.



Joan Crawford must have seen some of herself in the character of Midred Pierce, as she also supported herself as a waitress and saleswoman before she achieved success as an actress.


September 24, 1958 -
The Donna Reed Show premiered on ABC-TV on this date. Ladies (and some men), don't you always wears heels, pearls and chic frocks to do the housework?



The first season opening credits of The Munsters were an outrageous parody of the opening credits of The Donna Reed Show, which always began with Donna Reed lovingly passing out lunches to her departing family members as they left the house one by one. Yvonne De Carlo, as Lily Munster, did the same thing.


Today in History:
September 24, 1896 -
... In a real dark night of the soul it is always three o'clock in the morning, day after day.



On this date in 1896, a young Minnesota woman gave birth to a depressive young alcoholic named Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald.

The boy did badly in school and went to train for war in 1918. While training at Camp Sheridan in Alabama, he fell in love with Zelda Sayre, the mentally unstable daughter of an Alabama Supreme Court judge.

The war ended before Fitzgerald could be sent overseas and shot, however, so he went to New York to become rich and famous. He became neither, so Zelda broke off their engagement.

Fitzgerald then moved back to Minnesota. A year later he became a famous writer. He moved to Connecticut, Zelda married him, and they became drunken celebrity wrecks.

They spent a lot of time in Europe. This lasted until Zelda went mad and Fitzgerald died.



Fitzgerald is best remembered for having said the rich were different, even though Hemingway kept telling him to act like a man and strip down, grease himself up and get into a boxing ring.



Oh yeah, he also wrote several books.

... Things are sweeter when they're lost. I know--because once I wanted something and got it. It was the only thing I ever wanted badly, Dot, and when I got it it turned to dust in my hand...


September 24, 1954 -
Steve Allen sat down at his piano and the Tonight Show premiered on NBC on this date.



Simply called Tonight, the show was a blend of comedy, interview and musical performance that set the basic template for future late-night television.


September 24, 1961-
Students of Great Comedy lined up around the block to enroll in Whatsamatta U when The Bullwinkle Show moved to primetime on NBC TV on this date.



The first story of the season was an epic multi-part adventure about the moose and squirrel's search for the elusive Kirwood Derby. In November 1961, Durward Kirby threatened to file suit. Jay Ward reportedly responded to the threat, in his usual style, by offering to let Kirby use any name of his choosing for any character from his show.


September 24, 1964 -
We all visited 1313 Mockingbird Lane for the first time when The Munsters premieres on TV on this date.



Bill Mumy was the original choice for Eddie Munster, but his parents didn't approve of the extensive makeup that would be used for his character. He would eventually guest on the episode "Come Back, Little Googie", playing an incorrigible brat, during the first season.


September 24, 1969 -
The trial of the "Chicago Eight" (later seven) began. Demonstrations began outside the court house, with the Weatherman group proclaiming the "Days of Rage" in protest of the trial. The Chicago Eight staged demonstrations at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago to protest the Vietnam War and its support by the top Democratic presidential candidate, Vice President Hubert Humphrey. These anti-Vietnam War protests were some of the most violent in American history as the police and national guardsmen beat antiwar protesters, innocent bystanders and members of the press.



Five defendants (Tom Hayden, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, David Dellinger, Rennie Davis) were convicted of crossing state lines to incite riots at the 1968 Democratic national convention; the convictions were ultimately overturned.


Luna 16 was the first robotic probe to land on the Moon and return a sample to Earth.. An automatic drilling rig was deployed and 101 grams of lunar soil was collected.

The samples were returned to Earth on September 24, 1970 and marked the first time lunar sampled were recovered by an unmanned spacecraft.


September 24, 1991 -
Theodor Seuss Geisel, an American writer and cartoonist best known for his classic children's books under the pen name Dr. Seuss, including The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham, How the Grinch Stole Christmas and One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish, died on this date.



No greater tribute was given to the Doctor than when the Reverend Jesse Jackson appeared on SNL following his death.



And so it goes

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