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St. Clare of Assisi (or Clair or Claire – spelling wasn’t a major issue back then. Living past 29 years old was considered miraculous) didn’t want to marry the rich young man her parents picked out for her and ran away from home to become the biggest Francis of Assisi groupie in the world. StContinue reading “It’s the Feast of St. Clare today.”

August 10, 1962 –While not the worst film ever made – it is the sickest. The Brain That Wouldn’t Die, premiered on this date. (Watch it now.) This was the first movie watched by Michael J. Nelson after Joel Hodgson had left in the previous episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000.

August 10, 1950 –Billy Wilder’s caustic, black-hearted masterpiece, Sunset Boulevard premiered in New York City, on this date. When Gloria Swanson finished Norma’s final scene, the mad staircase descent, she burst into tears and the crew applauded. Even though it wasn’t the last scene filmed, Billy Wilder threw a party for her as soon asContinue reading “Sunset Boulevard”

The most popular campfire treat is recognized each year on August 10th. In 1927, Girl Scouts troop leader Loretta Scott Crew wrote a recipe for “Some Mores,” and published it in Tramping and Trailing With the Girl Scouts, an official Girl Scouts publication, though the exact origin of S’mores is unknown. x This delicious, gooeyContinue reading “For your burning coals give me refreshment.”

August 9, 1945 –Just three days after Little Boy was dropped on Hiroshima, a second atomic bomb (a 22 kiloton Atomic Bomb) called Fat Man was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, population 270,000, by the U.S. B-29 bomber Bockscar. Though the amount of energy generated by the bomb was significantly larger than that of the LittleContinue reading “If I had foreseen Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I would have torn up my formula in 1905. – Albert Einstein”

It’s the day recognizes the succession plan of the President of the United States. The day also acknowledges the one president who was neither elected vice president nor president – Gerald Ford. And so it goes

August 9, 1930 –A forerunner of the cartoon character Betty Boop made her debut in Max Fleischer’s animated short Dizzy Dishes on this date. In later films she loses the dog ears and becomes the familiar human character we know today. And so it goes

August 8, 1960 –Decca Records in England refuses to release Ray Peterson’s latest single, Tell Laura I Love Her, going so far as to throw away 25,000 pressings of the teen-tragedy song, which they feel is “too tasteless and vulgar for the English sensibility.“ A cover by Ricky Valance proves them wrong by going straightContinue reading “My love for her will never die”

August 8, 1968 –Richard M. Nixon was nominated for president at the Republican National Convention in Miami Beach. Later that day, Nixon chose Maryland Gov. Spiro T. Agnew to be his running mate. August 8, 1973 –VP Spiro T Agnew branded as “damned lies” reports he took kickbacks from government contracts in Maryland on thisContinue reading “Richard Nixon – Beware the 8th of August!”

August 7 is annually recognizes a famous sea serpent sighting. This sighting was made by the men and officers of HMS Daedalus in August 1848 during a voyage to Saint Helena in the South Atlantic. The 60 foot long creature that they saw held a peculiar maned head above the ocean water. I, for one,Continue reading “Armless, harmless, ten foot tall and wet.”