Happy Birthday Christopher Durang

From the wildly absurdist imagination of Christopher Durang (born on this day in 1949) comes the plays Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You (1979) for which he won an Obie Award, Beyond Therapy (1981), Baby With the Bathwater (1983), and Mrs. Bob Cratchit's Wild Christmas Binge (2002).

Durang's works are frequently mounted in regional theatres across the US and Canada, but he hasn't allowed any of them to be adapted for the movies since Robert Altman savaged Beyond Therapy in 1987.

Durang's work often explores the cognitive dissonance between what the Catholic Church says (ie: the teachings of Christ) and what it does (the exact opposite of what it says); one of the first playwrights to show gay men being sensible (as opposed to walking punch-lines), of course Durang is gay himself, having lived with his partner John Augustine for more than 20 years.

Durang continues to write, and is co-chair of the playwriting program at Juilliard.
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Pop History Moment: The Lindbergh Baby Trial Opened

The justice system, in its own way, is responsible for a great portion of my cynicism; often, in their zeal to catch anyone for some crime or other, court officials toss aside rational thought and concrete evidence in favour of whatever poor schmuck they happen to have in custody. I've seen (or, more often, read about) it happening again and again, and each time it does it reduces my faith in so-called justice. On the plus side, though, it does keep me on my best behaviour...

On this day in 1935 one such trial opened in Flemington, New Jersey; it involved the most sensational news story of its time, the March 1932 kidnap of the son of one of America's heroes - aviator Charles Lindbergh - and his wife, the author Anne Morrow Lindbergh. The baby's corpse was discovered in May of that same year; his infant's death was the impetus behind the Lindbergh Law, which made kidnapping a federal offense.

Collared for the crime after more than two-and-a-half years of investigation was one Bruno Hauptmann, a German World War I veteran and would-be carpenter; unable to find work in Germany, Hauptmann embraced a life of crime (including break-and enter and armed robbery) which eventually saw him incarcerated at Bautzen. It took three attempts, but Hauptmann eventually landed in the United States in November 1923, under an assumed identity, following which he married Anna Schoeffler; together they had a son.

Hauptmann was arrested in September 1934, and held on $100,000 bail; Lindbergh, who attended every day of the trial in person, was represented in court by Col. Henry S. Breckinridge, who had also acted as the intermediary in the ransom negotiations. Hauptmann was represented by Edward J. Reilly (called the 'Bull of Brooklyn'), the prosecution by David Wilentz (then the Attorney-General of New Jersey) in front of Judge Thomas Trenchard.

The usual string of witnesses were brought forth, including the Lindberghs themselves, various of their servants, state troopers (including Norman Schwarzkopf, father of the American general), and several eye-witnesses. The most damning of the evidence was largely circumstantial, and some of it was later revealed to have been planted.

Following 11 hours and 24 minutes of deliberation in February 1935, a jury found Hauptmann guilty despite major gaps in the evidence, including no credible witnesses able to put him near the Lindbergh's estate at Hopewell at any time. He was executed by an electric chair called Old Smokey at the New Jersey State Prison in Trenton in April 1936, still proclaiming his innocence; a more likely candidate for guilt, the shadowy figure of Isidor Fisch, had already returned to Germany, where he died in March 1934.
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POPnews (EU) - January 1st

[The elevation of Sweden's Princess Victoria to the status of Crown Princess was the source of some controversy, even within the Royal Family itself; her father, King Carl XVI Gustaf - although said not to be opposed to women taking the throne nevertheless wasn't happy about having his son Carl Philip, Duke of Värmland, set aside in the process. Currently the only female heir to any throne in the world (notwithstanding Monaco's Princess Caroline, who is that country's de facto heir, being heiress presumptive rather than heiress apparent) Princess Victoria married personal trainer Daniel Westling in a lavish ceremony in June 2010.]
1438 - Albert II, the Habsburg Duke of Austria, was crowned King of Hungary.

1515 - France's King Francis I succeeded to the throne, filling the vacancy there left by the death of his first cousin, Louis XII.

1527 - Croatia's nobility elected Austria's Ferdinand I King of Croatia in the Parliament on Cetin.

1707 - John V was crowned King of Portugal.

1739 - Bouvet Island was discovered by French explorer Jean-Baptiste Charles Bouvet de Lozier.

1801 - The dwarf planet Ceres was discovered by Giuseppe Piazzi.

1822 - The Greek Constitution of 1822 was adopted by the First National Assembly of Epidaurus.

1876 - The Reichsbank opened in Berlin.

1945 - In retaliation for the Malmedy massacre, US troops massacred 30 SS prisoners at Chenogne; on the same day the German Luftwaffe launched Unternehmen Bodenplatte, a massive but ultimately failed attempt to knock out Allied air power in northern Europe in a single blow.

1958 - The European Community was established.

1973 - Denmark and the Republic of Ireland were admitted into the European Community, on the same day as the UK.

1980 - Sweden's three-year-old Princess Victoria was made that country's Crown Princess in accordance with changes made to that country's Successionsordningen, or Act of Succession, in 1979.

1981 - The Republic of Greece was admitted into the European Community.

1986 - The Kingdom of Spain and the Portuguese Republic were admitted into the European Community.

1993 - Czechoslovakia was divided into the Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

1995 - The Kingdom of Sweden and the republics of Austria and Finland were admitted into the European Union.

1998 - The European Central Bank was established.

1999 - The Euro currency was introduced.

2007 - Bulgaria and Romania officially joined the European Union; also, Bulgarian, Romanian, and Irish became official languages of the European Union, joining 20 others.
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POPnews (US) - January 1st

[The first Rose Queen was Hallie Woods in 1905; this one is Joan Culver, from 1956, while in 2009 (the first year I posted this) the Rose Queen was Courtney Chou Lee. Despite my ambivalence towards beauty pageants - an attitude that would no doubt be different if I were eligible for one - who am I not to post a photo of six fuschia organdy dresses?]
1845 - Brooklyn's Cobble Hill Tunnel was finished, running beneath Atlantic Avenue from Hicks Street to Boerum Place.

1863 - Daniel Freeman made the first claim under the Homestead Act, for a farm in Nebraska.

1890 - The first Tournament of Roses Parade was held in Pasadena, California - twelve years before the first Rose Bowl game in 1902.

1892 - Ellis Island opened its doors to new immigrants.

1898 - New York City annexed land from its surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York; the four initial boroughs, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and The Bronx, were joined later that month by Staten Island to create the modern city of five boroughs.

1908 - For the first time, a ball was dropped in New York City's Times Square to signify the start of the New Year at midnight.

1909 - Drilling began on the Lakeview Gusher in California's Midway-Sunset Oil Field; regarded as the largest oil well gusher in the world, it was drained after just 18 months, having produced 90,000 barrels a day at its peak.

1934 - Alcatraz Island became a US federal prison; it had previously served as a military prison during the US Civil War.

1939 - William Hewlett and David Packard founded Hewlett-Packard.

1942 - The Declaration by the United Nations was signed by twenty-six nations during the Arcadia Conference in Washington, DC.

1962 - US Navy SEALs were established.

1983 - The ARPANET officially changed to using the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.

1990 - David Dinkins was sworn in as New York City's first black mayor.
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Father Guido Sarducci Explains The Five Minute University

Here one of the Pop Culture Institute's spiritual leaders, Father Guido Sarducci, pitches his idea for the Five Minute University to the audience of Gilda Live, a concert recorded by Gilda Radner both in Boston and at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 1980, directed (for stage and screen) by Mike Nichols and produced by Lorne Michaels.

Sarducci, of course, is the creation (rather than the evolution) of comedian Don Novello - born on this day in 1943; the fact that he is not yet Pope dismays me more than I can say. And yes, I know he's not a real priest - I'm just saying, he'd have to be better at it than the current guy, is all...
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Joey Stefano: Chachi Loves Chachi

Ever since the quintessential Chachi - the inimitable Scott Baio - first sashayed across the soundstage of Happy Days, there's been a soft spot in my brain for cute, tough, little Italian guys; of course, I'd hate to meet an actual one in person, for fear of earning myself a thumping*, but from the convenient distance of a telephoto lens or thanks to the intercession of modern consumer electronics there's nothing with quite the same combination of tough and tender...

That must have been what first attracted me to Joey Stefano. Yeah, that must have been it. Not the heroic manner with which he entertained Ryan Idol's member in 1990's beachfront all-male epic Idol Eyes, and certainly not for the electrifying performance he gave in Chi Chi LaRue's ground-breaking More of a Man...

Of course, porn stars are intended to evoke archetypes, so as to enrichen the otherwise quotidian purpose of the material; in quite the opposite way grimy setting, poor lighting, paper-thin plot, and cheesy music take away from the experience, once the action is got down to the model is free to inhabit the viewer's imagination, which can whisk him unimpeded back through memory, to some glancing encounter with an unobtainable beauty, and evoke something that never was but that needed to be and make it so in some small way. Either that, or he's just a hot guy I like rubbing one out to before overthinking my justification for the whole exhilarating process!

For whatever reason, there was something fascinating about Joey Stefano, and the same cannot be said for all of his costars; honestly, he was eminently watchable, even with his clothes on. Tragedy, of course, plays as great a part in his star quality as the versatility of his performances; born on this day in 1968, his was a short, brutal life which ended with a whimper in November 1994, whereas it had been lived with considerable banging.

I've recommended Charles Isherwood's book Wonder Bread and Ecstasy: The Life and Death of Joey Stefano to my readers before, but I also believe that it should be read by anyone bent on a career in gay porno. Not that everyone contemplating such a move necessarily came from such a shitty home as he did, raised within a culture of addiction and violence, dogged by the shame that only dogma brings. Still, for an industry whose reputation for eating its young is scarcely ameliorated by its filming of the process, I say the best thing they could do in future is provide their prospectives with the shining example of his worst-case scenario and thereby possibly prevent such a thing from happening again, if only once...

*Or worse, for fear of enjoying said thumping.
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In Memoriam: Alfred Stieglitz

His early photographs of New York City continue to exert an influence over the practice of street photography, and his nudes, so revolutionary in their day, still have the power to awe...

For elevating photography to an art form, photographers should be forever grateful to Alfred Stieglitz; in 1902 he co-founded the Photo-Secession movement with Edward Steichen, Gertrude Kasebier, Clarence White and Alvin Langdon Coburn to insist that photography should have its own aesthetic, that 'a photograph should look like a photograph' and not a painting, which was a revolutionary moment in the earliest days of the art form.

In later life, Steiglitz would be better known for his relationship with the much younger Georgia O'Keeffe, the scandal of which was sweetened by their fruitful collaboration as artists.

Alfred Stieglitz was born on this day in 1864.
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"Roll Away The Stone" by Mott The Hoople

Birthday wishes go out today to Morgan Fisher, who joined British glam rock band Mott the Hoople as its keyboardist at the apex of their success; in other words, at just about the time it would be rent asunder by the egos of its members and the greed of their label... Not that I'm bitter.

Roll Away the Stone originally appeared on the band's 1974 album The Hoople; to me the band's sound is a melding* of Ray Davies of The Kinks and David Bowie**. Their real claim to fame, though, wasn't Fisher but Ian Hunter, who went on to pen the iconic song Cleveland Rocks - which has been used as the theme tune for The Drew Carey Show, albeit in a cover version recorded by Presidents of the United States of America.

*Which I'd have been well into watching at the time, since back then they were both still hot...
**Who actually produced the band's earlier albums (including 1972's All the Young Dudes, a personal favourite of mine).
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POPnews (UK) - January 1st

[Although it wouldn't be officially opened by Queen Victoria until May 21st (not coincidentally her birthday) the Manchester Ship Canal opened to traffic on this day in 1894; the 36-mile (58 km) long waterway - known in the charming local patois as the 'Big Ditch' - made the rivers Irwell and Mersey navigable for seagoing ships from the Mersey Estuary to Salford Docks, transforming what was then a landlocked industrial powerhouse into an international port.]
1651 - England's exiled King Charles II was crowned King of Scotland at Scone.

1772 - The first traveler's cheques - which could be used in 90 European cities - went on sale at the London Credit Exchange Company in London, more than a century before Thomas Cook made a name for himself doing that very thing; American Express, now the largest issuer of traveler's cheques, was a latecomer to the game, beginning operations only in 1891.

1788 - The first edition of The Times of London - previously The Daily Universal Register - was published.

1818 - Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus was published anonymously by the publishing firm of Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor & Jones of London.

1877 - England's Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India.

1894 - The Manchester Ship Canal opened.

1901 - The British colonies of New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania and Western Australia federated as the Commonwealth of Australia; Edmund Barton was appointed the new country's first Prime Minister.

1906 - British India officially adopted Indian Standard Time.

1948 - British railways were nationalized to form British Rail.

1957 - An Irish Republican Army unit attacked the Brookeborough barracks of the Royal Ulster Constabulary in one of the most famous incidents of the IRA's Operation Harvest.

1973 - The United Kingdom joined the European Union.

1978 - South African Donald Woods, former editor of the East London Daily Dispatch, arrived in London having fled the apartheid regime after he and his family were targeted for his controversial friendship with Steve Biko; he was later portrayed by Kevin Kline in Sir Richard Attenborough's 1987 film Cry Freedom.

1984 - The Sultanate of Brunei gained its independence from the United Kingdom.

1985 - Britain's first mobile phone call was made by television comedian Ernie Wise - out of Morecambe and Wise - to Vodafone.

1995 - Gloucester builder turned serial killer Fred West was found hanging in his cell at Winson Green prison near Birmingham.
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Pop History Moment: Samuel Pepys Begins His Diary

Blessed be God, at the end of the last year I was in very good health, without any sense of my old pain but upon taking of cold. I lived in Axe yard, having my wife and servant Jane, and no more in family than us three. My wife, after the absence of her terms for seven weeks, gave me hopes of her being with child, but on the last day of the year she hath them again...

When, on this day in 1660, Samuel Pepys of London began keeping a diary with those very words, nobody - least of all him - could have predicted the sweep of history he'd end up recording there during the nine-and-a-half years he kept at it.

While his take on the current events of the day - the Interregnum and the failure of Cromwell's Protectorate, the restoration of Charles II (at which he was present, having accompanied Sir Edward Montagu to the place of the King's exile at Breda, in the Netherlands), the Second Dutch War, the Great Plague of 1665, and the following year's Great Fire of London - make for an interesting enough read, it's the minutiae of his own life, from his illnesses to his petty squabbles to his lusty embraces, which are most enlightening, rendered as they are by him with great wit and extraordinary empathy.

Pepys protected his musings from prying eyes by keeping them in shorthand, which would take their eventual translator three years to decipher. Although the diary was initially begun for personal reasons, Pepys later rewrote and bound the pages he'd made, as well as indexing them in amongst his rather substantial library (which contained 3,000 volumes at his death, including the diary) as though he expected they would one day be published.

For all his modesty, Pepys was as illustrious as his colleagues in the Royal Society, men such as Sir Isaac Newton and Sir Christopher Wren; his friend John Evelyn remembered him as 'universally beloved, hospitable, generous, learned in many things'. First a civil servant and later an MP, Samuel Pepys walked amongst some of the most illustrious people of any age as one of their own. For all his erudition, though, Pepys could never have foreseen that one day his old words would be given new life on a thing called the Internet in a thing called a blog, which it is; the link is on the blogroll here at the Pop Culture Institute, as well as behind the picture, but I'll include it here too.

Pepys - born in February 1633 - abandoned his diary in May 1669; he died in May 1703.
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"Happy New Year" by ABBA

Happy New Year, which appears on ABBA's 1980 album Super Trouper, is not a song with which I was familiar before I first posted it on this day in 2008; I find it oddly reassuring that, as much as I know about ABBA, there is still so much left to learn... Others of you - Mr. Barr, for instance - might find this possibility disturbing, I know, which I find hilarious.

Here, then, are Agnetha, Benny, Anni-Frid, and Bjorn working their usual magic...
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POPnews - January 1st

[Vancouver's sylvan Point Grey neighbourhood (in the foreground) is possessed of some of the city's finest homes, which are themselves occupied by some of the city's most insufferably stuck-up people - and that's really saying something, given the massive influx of nouveau-riche douchebags the city as a whole has seen over the last decade.]
1804 - French rule ended in Haiti, which became the world's first black republic and the first colony in the West Indies to gain its independence, under Jean-Jacques Dessalines - one of two generals who served under Toussaint L'Ouverture. (The other was Henri Christophe.)

1810 - Major-General Lachlan Macquarie officially became Governor of New South Wales.

1880 - Ferdinand de Lesseps began the French phase of construction on the Panama Canal.

1912 - The Republic of China was established.

1929 - The former municipalities of Point Grey and South Vancouver were amalgamated into Vancouver.

1950 - The state of Ajaigarh was ceded to the Government of India.

1956 - The Republic of the Sudan gained its independence from the Egyptian Republic and the United Kingdom.

1959 - Fulgencio Batista, president of Cuba, was overthrown by Fidel Castro's forces during the Cuban Revolution.

1960 - The Republic of Cameroon gained its independence from France and the United Kingdom.

1962 - Western Samoa gained its independence from New Zealand and changed its name to the Independent State of Western Samoa.

1965 - The People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan was founded in Kabul.

1966 - Following a coup, Colonel Jean-Bédel Bokassa assumed power as president of the Central African Republic.

1982 - Peruvian Javier Pérez de Cuéllar became the first Latin American to hold the title of Secretary General of the United Nations.

1986 - Aruba gained its independence from Curaçao, though it remains in free association with the Kingdom of the Netherlands to this day.

1994 - The Zapatista Army of National Liberation initiated twelve days of armed conflict in the Mexican State of Chiapas.

1997 - Ghanaian diplomat Kofi Annan was appointed Secretary General of the United Nations.

2000 - As the world celebrated, no major crisis arose from the dreaded Y2K computer 'millennium bug'.
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Happy 2011!

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"On The Radio" by Donna Summer

Whether or not Donna Summer - born on this day in 1948 - ever said AIDS was a punishment from God* in the early Eighties, the damage to her once-stellar career was done. Her core fan base gone, the string of hits that made her the undisputed Queen of Disco evaporated almost as quickly as disco did; only the rock-flavoured She Works Hard for the Money managed to climb the charts in 1983 before she appeared to be washed up.

Nevertheless, at her peak she could do no wrong; Love to Love You Baby (1975), I Feel Love (1977), Last Dance and MacArthur Park (1978), Hot Stuff and Bad Girls (1979), and On the Radio (1980) are among the dozens of singles she released which form the greater part of the era's soundtrack.

In 1989 she returned to dance floor dominance - even in gay clubs - with This Time I Know It's For Real, from the album Another Place and Time, and in 2004 she was among the first inductees in the Dance Music Hall of Fame.

*And there are those who weren't even there who'll insist she did, even though she has been vehemently denying she said it ever since she is alleged to have said it. For the record, the Pop Culture Institute is willing to believe her version of events.
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Happy Birthday Bebe Neuwirth

Although for many of us, our first encounter with Bebe Neuwirth came when she portrayed Lilith Sternin, the romantic foil to Frasier Crane on Cheers - for which she earned Emmy Awards in 1990 and 1991 - she was a respected member of the Broadway community first, having made her stage debut in 1980 as Sheila in A Chorus Line; she's also appeared in such movies as Say Anything (1989), Green Card (1990), and Bugsy (1991).

However, I could listen to her performance of Velma Kelly in the 1996 revival of Chicago all day long - I know because I often have.

A graduate of Juilliard, Neuwirth was honoured with a Tony Award for her role in Chicago, as well as for her performance in the 1986 revival of Sweet Charity; she was also hailed in the 1994 revival of Damn Yankees and most recently became the latest in a string of actresses to portray Morticia Addams in the Broadway version of The Addams Family opposite Nathan Lane as Gomez Addams.
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POPnews - December 31st

[Except for New Year's Eve 1962, during which heavy snow caused the pendulum to detach and forced it to ring ten minutes late, and New Year's Eve 1976, which was interrupted due to major damage to the clock mechanism earlier that year, Big Ben has rung in the new year in the British capital every year since it was first built in 1859.]
1229 - An army commanded by Aragon's King James I - who was known as 'the Conqueror ' - entered Medina Mayurqa (which he promptly renamed Palma) thus completing the Christian reconquest of the island of Majorca.

1600 - The British East India Company was chartered by England's Queen Elizabeth I.

1687 - The first Huguenots, fleeing religious persecution in France, set sail for the Cape of Good Hope.

1831 - Gramercy Park was deeded to New York City by Samuel B. Ruggles; the oldest private park in the United States, it's gated, and local residents are able to buy keys.

1857 - Queen Victoria chose Ottawa for Canada's capital over the likes of Toronto and Montreal, both of which have been over-compensating for it ever since.

1862 - The USS Monitor sank off North Carolina's Cape Hatteras.

1879 - Thomas Edison demonstrated incandescent lighting to the public for the first time, at Menlo Park.

1904 - The first New Year's Eve celebration was held in Manhattan's Times Square, then still known as Longacre Square.

1909 - The Manhattan Bridge opened.

1923 - The chimes of Big Ben were broadcast on BBC radio for the first time to mark the arrival of the New Year.

1929 - Guy Lombardo performed Auld Lang Syne at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City for the first time; coming as it did just two months after the Wall Street crashed must have given it the utmost poignance.

1960 - The farthing coin ceased to be legal tender in the United Kingdom.

1963 - The Central African Federation officially collapsed, splitting into Zambia, Malawi and Rhodesia.

1981 - A coup d'état in Ghana removed President Hilla Limann's PNP government and replaced it with the Provisional National Defence Council led by Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings.

1986 - A fire at the Dupont Plaza Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico, killed 97 and injured 140.

1987 - Robert Mugabe assumed office as President of Zimbabwe; he clings to power still, but for how long...

1992 - Czechoslovakia was dissolved, resulting in the creation of the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

1999 - Boris Yeltsin resigned as President of Russia, leaving Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in charge.

2007 - Boston's massive Big Dig construction project ended.
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"Hold On Tight" by Electric Light Orchestra

Birthday wishes go out today to Jeff Lynne, founding member and principal songwriter for the Electric Light Orchestra, who are also known as ELO; Lynne's career also incorporates the Eighties super-group Traveling Wilburys, to which end he recorded two albums with George Harrison, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty and Bob Dylan.

Hold on Tight originally appeared on the band's 1981 concept album Time. I choose to post it here because of its obvious New Year's overtones; having completed another year of striving on behalf of the Pop Culture Institute, another year of coming into my own, and of having to hold on tight as things are finally starting to take off...
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Pop History Moment: The Fall Of A Tyrant

I have to admit, I never thought they'd do it...

I never thought anyone would have the guts to actually execute Saddam Hussein; I figured they'd just drag it out until he died in custody, Milosevic-style. When I awoke to the news of it on this day in 2006 I went back to sleep, only to dream that he'd then been reanimated and was on the loose inside the Green Zone, until Dick Cheney started shooting at him and he turned into a giant Zombie pinata.

This is what happens when you eat Slim Jims before bed, kids. Especially when high.

A n y w a y...

Maybe it was naive of me to think that the respect for human life so amply demonstrated by the US and Iraqi governments over the years would apply to even the greatest of villains; in fact, I know it was naive of me to think that, stupid even - albeit hilarious - which is probably why I did it in the first place.

Still, I was shocked - shocked! - when I heard that he'd been hanged, at Camp Justice. It was only a matter of time (in fact it was in the very same news cycle) that bootlegged footage of the execution itself, botches and all, had been released. Ironically, for as high as he'd gotten, it was an all-too-short fall that provided better justice for Saddam Hussein than he had ever shown his people.

All in all, it made for a real yikes of a day...
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"Runaway" by Del Shannon

Vintage footage of birthday boy Del Shannon here, performing his smash hit Runaway circa 1961, which features the first sustained synthesizer solo, in this instance provided by the Clavioline. The song's success would not only electrify audiences, but its electrification would change the sound of pop music forever...
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POPnews - December 30th

[Back in the olden days robber barons capitalists like James
Gadsden used their influence within the federal government
to line their own pockets... Thank goodness that kind
of corruption doesn't occur anymore!]
1066 - A Muslim mob stormed the royal palace in Granada, crucifying the city's Jewish vizier Joseph ibn Naghrela and massacring most of the Jewish population of the city in what came to be known as the Granada Massacre.

1460 - During the so-called Wars of the Roses the Battle of Wakefield pitted the House of Lancaster's Margaret of Anjou against Richard, Duke of York - aptly enough of the House of York.

1853 - The US paid Mexico $10 million for the Gadsden Purchase, which works out to about 53 cents an acre for a parcel of land in southern Arizona and New Mexico which would become the final addition made to the lower 48; it was bought at the behest of James Gadsden, who negotiated the deal, then used the land to complete his transcontinental railroad.

1896 - José Rizal was executed by firing squad in Manila; widely considered a martyr of the Philippine Revolution, his death is currently celebrated as a holiday in the Philippines.

1903 - A fire at the Iroquois Theater in Chicago killed 600 just 37 days after it opened; the club's promotional advertising had promised it was 'absolutely fireproof'.

1905 - Former Idaho Governor Frank Steunenberg was assassinated near his home in Caldwell, possibly by Canadian-born labour leader Harry Orchard.

1916 - The last coronation in Hungary was performed for King Charles IV and Queen Zita.

1922 - The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was formed.

1927 - The Ginza Line, Asia's first subway, opened in Tokyo.

1943 - Subhash Chandra Bose raised the flag of Indian independence at Port Blair, apparently.

1947 - King Michael of Romania was forced to abdicate by his new Soviet-backed Communist government; it was revealed 60 years later that His Majesty was told if he didn't 1,000 students would be executed, so he did.

1948 - Cole Porter's Broadway musical Kiss Me, Kate - based on William Shakespeare's play The Taming of the Shrew - opened at the New Century Theatre; originally starring Alfred Drake and Patricia Morison, it ran for 1,077 performances, as well as becoming the first show to win the Best Musical Tony Award.

1965 - Ferdinand Marcos became President of the Philippines.

1977 - Ted Bundy escaped from his cell in Glenwood Springs, Colorado; it was a clean getaway, as his captors didn't notice he was missing for 17 hours. While eluding capture in Florida Bundy managed to kill Lisa Levy and Margaret Bowman (as well as sexually assaulting Levy) and severely injure Karen Chandler and Kathy Kleiner, all Chi Omega sorority sisters. He also crippled Cheryl Thomas before abducting, raping, and murdering Kimberly Leach, before he was recaptured, accidentally, by Pensacola police officer David Lee in February 1978.

1986 - A bus chartered by the Swift Current Broncos - a junior team in the Western Hockey League - crashed during bad weather outside of their hometown, killing 4 players and injuring 1. At the time of the crash the team was on its way to play a game in Regina, where I was living at the time, against the Regina Pats. Among the players who survived the crash was Joe Sakic, the future Hall-of-Famer who currently plays with the Colorado Avalanche.

1994 - John Salvi murdered Lee Ann Nichols and Shannon Lowney during shootings at two abortion clinics in Brookline, Massachusetts; despite being sentenced to serve two consecutive life sentences for his crimes, these convictions were overturned by the sentencing judge - Barbara Dortch-Okara - following Salvi's November 2006 jailhouse suicide, invoking the legal principle that a conviction may not stand if the accused dies before his appeals are exhausted.

1995 - The lowest temperature ever recorded in the UK was recorded in Scotland; no surprise there. A bone-chilling -27.2°C was recorded at Altnaharra in the Scottish Highlands. This equalled the record set at Braemar, in Aberdeenshire, in February 1895 and January 1982.

2004 - A fire in the República Cromagnon nightclub in Buenos Aires killed 194.

2006 - 2 people were killed and 26 injured when Madrid's Barajas International Airport was bombed; the separatist organization ETA later claimed responsibility.
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