Alf, Uncle Martin, and Mork’s home planets on the TV series Mork and Mindy are as follows: Alf (voice by Paul Fusco) Melmac Uncle Martin (Ray Walston) Mars Mork (Robin Williams) Ork
Louis B. Mayer’s first film star was Anita Stewart. She starred in Virtuous Wives (1918), the first film made by Mayer’s production company, Alco (later Metro).
Mongkut of Siam, the king in The King and I, had 9,000 wives and concubines. King Solomon, by contrast, had only 700.
“The Flying Nun” (ABC, 1967-70) was based on the novel The Fifteenth Pelican by Tere Rios.
Giovanni da Verrazano, an Italian explorer, first sighted Manhattan in 1524. However, English explorer Henry Hudson, who sailed into what is now known as the Hudson River in 1609, is credited as the island’s discoverer.
There have been four Madison Square Gardens, but only the first two were on Madison Square, at Madison Avenue and East Twenty-sixth Street. The first arena, originally a railroad depot, was given the name Madison Square Garden in 1879. The second was designed by Stanford White and built in 1890. The third, located between Forty-ninth … Read more
The Allied leaders who forced Germany to accept the Versailles Treaty of 1919 at the end of World War I were: Woodrow Wilson (U.S.) Georges Clemenceau (France) David Lloyd George (Great Britain) Vittorio Orlando (Italy)
Scheherazade is the narrator of the Arabian Nights (c. 1450), who tells stories night after night to keep her husband, the Sultan Schahriah, from strangling her at dawn. Scheherazade tells her stories to her sister Dinarzade in the Sultan’s hearing.
Arsene Lupin (1932), a detective story set in Paris, was the first movie featuring both John Barry-more and Lionel Barrymore.
Ernie Bilko (Phil Silvers) served in the army in “The Phil Silvers Show,” which ran from 1955 to 1959.
“Richie Brockelman, Private Eye” (NBC, 1978), starring Dennis Dugan in the title role, was a spinoff of the TV series “The Rockford Files” (NBC, 1974-80).
Washington Irving is believed to have originated the expression “the Almighty Dollar” in Wolfert’s Roost (1855).
Mark Twain said, “Man is the only animal that blushes. Or needs to”.
English was not spoken in England until 449, when three Germanic tribes from Denmark, the Jutes, Angles, and Saxons, invaded Britain. The Angles, who settled along the east coast of north and central England, developed literate culture and gave their name to the country (Angle-land, England). The language of these tribes, Anglo-Saxon or Old English, … Read more
It took Leonardo da Vinci four years (1503-1507) to paint the Mona Lisa. This was long enough for his patron, Francesco del Giocondo, to get impatient. Giocondo had commissioned the portrait of his third wife, Lisa, but enough was enough. Giocondo refused to pay for the unfinished portrait, and Leonardo sold it to the king … Read more
Blackboard Jungle (1955) was the first film to feature rock music. Bill Haley’s “Rock Around the Clock” played over the opening credits.
The Bedford Falls Company, producers of “thirtysomething” (ABC, 1987-1991), got its name from the town of Bedford Falls, New York, in It’s a Wonderful Life (1947). The company’s logo is a house in a snowstorm, based on the house in the movie, with the musical tag “. . . and dance by the light of … Read more
In the year 1860, on the eve of the Civil War, which was the height of slavery, the slave population in the U.S. was 3,953,760.
Vermont in 1777, was the first American colony to abolish slavery. The first of the original 13 Colonies to abolish slavery was Pennsylvania in 1780.
The author of the novels Song of Solomon (1977) and Beloved (1987) Toni Morrison was born Chloe Anthony Wofford.
Tom Hanks sang “The Way We Were” to his mother (Mercedes Ruehl) as proof her son was alive in Big (1988).
The Wings of Eagles was based on World War I aviator Frank “Spig” Wead, who after a debilitating accident, became a screenwriter. The screenplays he wrote included Air Mail (1932), The Citadel (1938), and They Were Expendable (1945).
The first spacecraft to land on the moon was Luna 2, launched by the USSR on September 12, 1959. It crash-landed between the craters Archimedes and Autolycus in the Mare Imbrium on September 14. A successful landing was made by Luna 9 on February 3, 1966.
At the outset of President George Washington’s first term (1789-93), they were: Thomas Jefferson—Secretary of State Alexander Hamilton—Secretary of the Treasury Henry Knox—Secretary of War Edmund Randolph—Attorney General
In 1846, the 29-year-old Henry David Thoreau was charged with nonpayment of a poll tax. Thoreau refused to pay because the tax was to be spent on the Mexican War, which he opposed. Thoreau’s friends paid the tax for him, after he spent the night of July 23, 1846, in jail. He described the experience … Read more
The skin on the foot or palm of the hand wrinkles when exposed to water because it expands. The thick, hardened layers of skin swell as water is retained.
NBC began national nightly newscasts in April 1944. CBS began national nightly newscasts in May 1948, read by Douglas Edwards. ABC began national nightly newscasts in August 1948, read by H. R. Baukhage and Jim Gibbons.
Running from the Hudson River to Lake Erie in what is now New York State, the warpath was a trail about a foot wide and six inches deep. The Iroquois traveled single file down this forest path when invading enemy territory.
The chimp’s name on the TV series “Me and the Chimp” (CBS, 1972) was Buttons, played by Jackie. The chimp’s human sidekick was Mike Reynolds, played by Ted Bessell.
“Laugh, and the world laughs with you,/ Weep, and you weep alone” are the opening lines of the poem “Solitude” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1855-1919).
Jim Henson and the Muppets made their national TV debut in 1957 on “The Tonight Show” (NBC, 1954), hosted then by Steve Allen. Kermit (only one year old at the time) sang “I’ve Grown Accustomed to Your Face” to a monster who ate its own face and tried to eat Kermit’s as well.
The hyoid bone resides by itself in the throat and does not connect with other bones. It supports the tongue and its muscles.
Derived from the German words Doppel (double) and Ganger (walker), a doppelganger is the personification of another side of a character’s personality. The apparition often represents a demonic side and may herald oncoming death.
Joseph McCarthy represented Wisconsin in the Senate. The Republican senator, famous for his investigations of alleged communists, served in the Senate from 1946 to 1957.
Lock Martin played Gort, the giant robot, in The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), then the doorman at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. Director Robert Wise gave him the job because he was the tallest man he knew.
House of Usher (1960; aka The Fall of the House of Usher). Like most of the films in the series, which also included The Masque of the Red Death (1964) and The Pit and the Pendulum (1961), it starred Vincent Price.
Tibetan Buddhists developed the prayer wheel as a substitute for the repeated recitation of mantras (syllables or verses of mystical power). The wheel is a hollow metal cylinder mounted on a rod, with the mantra written on a roll of paper inside the cylinder. The Buddhist turns the wheel by hand; each turn is believed … Read more
Dorothy Parker, known for her sharp wit, wrote the famous couplet, “Men seldom make passes/At girls who wear glasses” in the poem “News Item” in 1926.
Approximately 50,000 Americans were part of the Loyalist military support for the king. Few joined the British army and navy, but thousands served in provincial regiments under Loyalist officers. American Indians, mainly in Canada, on the frontier, and in the South, also fought for Britain.
In The Winter’s Tale, Act III, Scene 3. Antigonus, a lord of Sicilia, runs for his life after hearing “A savage clamor!” He doesn’t make it; his death is reported later in the scene.
Window washer Morse conquered the Worldwide Wicket Co., owned by Rudy Vallee in the movie How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.
Only two future presidents signed the Declaration of Independence, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. George Washington and James Madison were the only two to sign the Constitution.
The Castle of Otranto was inhabited by Manfred, the Prince of Otranto, with his family, in the 1764 Gothic novel The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole.
Bananas did not come from South America. Bananas first grew in tropical Asia and were eaten by the ancient Greeks and Romans. Banana plants were transported from the Canary Islands off northwest Africa to the Americas soon after the New World was discovered.
Mie Nemoto and Kei Masuda were the popular Japanese musical team Pink Lady, whose American variety show “Pink Lady and Jeff” lasted only one year (1980) on NBC. Jeff Altman was their American sidekick.
In act 1, scene 2 of Romeo and Juliet, Juliet’s father says she “hath not seen the change of fourteen years”, making her thirteen.
The Italian religious epic Jerusalem Delivered, written in 1575 by Torquato Tasso (1544-95), concerns the First Crusade, in which European Christians fought to regain the Holy Land from the Muslims. The First Crusade lasted from 1095 to 1099.
Some believe the custom of wearing wedding rings is a vestige of ancient barbarian marriages. This was when a man would capture a woman and bind her to his house in fetters, now symbolized by a ring. Others think the practice originated in ancient Egypt about 2800 B.C. As the circular ring has no beginning … Read more
In Greek mythology, Nike was the goddess of victory. She was the daughter of the giant Pallas and the river Styx. In Rome, Nike was called Victoria.
Monty Hall was a medical school student in Manitoba, Canada before he hosted “Let’s Make a Deal” (NBC, CBS, 1963-76).
The two Allied armies from America and Germany met on April 25, 1945, on the Elbe River at the town of Torgau. The Americans had been advancing from the west and the Russians from the east.
The title of Francis Bacon’s 1620 philosophical treatise Novum Organum means literally “new instrument.” It alludes to Aristotle’s treatise on logic and the theory of science, commonly known as the Organon.
The first movie Gene Wilder directed was The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes’ Smarter Brother (1975). He also wrote the screenplay and starred as Sigerson Holmes.
Roman Polanski played a spoons player in his film Repulsion (1965). Polanski also played the man with the knife who cuts Jack Nicholson’s nostril in his film Chinatown (1974).
Although John F. Kennedy received 303 electoral votes to Nixon’s 219, the popular vote was very close. Kennedy won by 118,550 votes, which represented 2/10 of 1 percent of the popular vote.
The Virginian (1929) introduced the line, “If you want to call me that, smile”. Gary Cooper said it. Owen Wister, author of the novel The Virginian, phrased it as “When you call me that, smile!”
The golliwog, a type of doll known as “the blackest gnome,” was invented by Florence K. Upton in The Adventures of Two Dutch Dolls and a “Golliwog” (1895). More golliwog tales followed until 1909.
“The George Burns and Grade Allen Show” (CBS) was on radio eighteen years-1932-1950 before it started on TV. It was on on both TV and radio for one year-1950. The TV version ran until September 1958.
Virginia Woolf drowned herself at the River Ouse near her home at Rodmell, Sussex, in 1941, following a bout with mental illness.
Five, the most Tonys won by any actor or actress. The awards were for her dramatic performances in the following plays: I Am a Camera (1952) The Lark (1956) Forty Carats (1969) The Last of Mrs. Lincoln (1973) The Belle of Amherst (1977)
A human fetus develops fingerprints at the age of three months.
Herman J. Mankiewicz and Orson Welles were credited with the screenplay for Citizen Kane (1940).
James Naismith was teaching at The YMCA Training College, now Springfield College, in Springfield, Massachusetts when he invented basketball. Naismith invented the game for his students in the winter of 1891-92 to provide indoor exercise between the football and baseball seasons.
Monsieur Hulot’ s Holiday (1953), Mon Oncle (1958), Playtime (1967), and Traffic (1971) were the four “Monsieur Hulot” movies. Monsieur Hulot was played in all four by Jacques Tati.
As presented in Thomas Malory’s Morte d’Arthur, Sir Galahad was the illegitimate son of Sir Lancelot and Princess Elaine. Also the last descendant of Joseph of Arimathea, he was the purest knight of the Knights of the Round Table.
The Oberammergau Passion Play is said to have originated in 1633, when the people of this village in Upper Bavaria vowed to stage it in order to be rescued from the plague. The play depicting Christ’s passion is performed every tenth year. It is said to have originated in 1633, when the people of this … Read more
Jack Johnson was the first black man to become heavyweight champion on December 26, 1908. He remained the champion until April 5, 1915, when Jess Willard defeated him in Havana, Cuba.
The practice, also called anthropophagy, is derived from the Spanish word for the Caribs. The Caribs were a West Indian tribe known for cannibalism.
Singer Frank Sinatra is known as the Chairman of the Board. Former New York Yankee pitcher Whitey Ford also earned the appellation.
The colorful, demagogic Huey Long (1893-1935), nicknamed the “Kingfish,” governed Louisiana from 1928 to 1932, when he resigned to enter the U.S. Senate. Elected in 1930, he deferred his entry into the Senate until 1932. He stayed there until he was killed by an assassin’s bullet in 1935. His wife finished his term.
Yarn was produced at the first American factory. It was produced at Samuel Slater’s Mill, founded in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1790. Workers at the spinning machines lived in company housing and worked for wages paid in credit at the company store. Cloth itself was not produced at the mill: The yarn was woven into … Read more
Astronomers once believed that a planet called Vulcan existed between the planet Mercury and the sun. Its existence, first proposed by French astronomer Urbain Jean Joseph Leverrier in 1845, was hypothesized to explain a discrepancy in Mercury’s orbit. Vulcan was even reported to have been observed once, but the observation was never confirmed. Einstein’s general … Read more
In Joseph Heller’s 1961 novel of the same name, it is the catch that prevents a U.S. Air Force pilot from asking to be grounded on the basis of insanity. A man “would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn’t, but if he was sane, he had to fly them. If … Read more
Jeeves’s boss was Bertie Wooster, a young man-about-town in P. G. Wodehouse’s stories beginning with My Man Jeeves (1919). Jeeves was his valet.
The line is from English writer Alexander Pope’s poem An Essay on Criticism. It actually reads “A little learning is a dangerous thing.”
The sensation, called neurapraxia, usually occurs when a nerve is compressed between a bone and another hard object. Blood continues to circulate through the affected area.
Forty-two percent of Americans classify themselves as politically moderate, according to a 1992 New York Times/CBS News Poll.
These lines from Section 27, Stanza 4 of Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s poem In Memoriam lament the loss of Tennyson’s close friend Arthur Hallam, who died at twenty-two.
“Amos ‘n’ Andy” (CBS, 1951-53) with Spencer Williams as Andy Brown and Alvin Childress as Amos Jones, was the first all-black sitcom on TV. Amos was a cabdriver, Andy a bachelor.
The seven bond drives during World War II, often led by top movie celebrities, yielded $61 billion. Among the more popular celebrity bond spokespersons were Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich.
Hawkeye’s real name on the TV series “M*A*S*H” (CBS, 1972-83) was Benjamin Franklin Pierce.
The practice of gyrating with hoops made of grapevines originated in ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome. The name hula, however, was not used until the 1700s, when British and American missionaries returned home with tales of island hoop-dancers. The modern plastic Hula-Hoop was developed in the 1950s by Richard P. Knerr and Arthur K. (“Spud”) … Read more
The Soviet port Yalta in the Crimea (now part of Ukraine) was the site of the February 1945 meeting of Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin.
The exterior of the bar in the TV series “Cheers” (NBC, 1982) was filmed at a Boston bar called “The Bull and Finch” on Beacon Street across from the Boston Common.
Ty Cobb stole home 46 times during his 22-year career with the Detroit Tigers and holds the record for stealing home.
“Dirty Sally” (CBS, 1974) was a spin off of “Gunsmoke” (CBS, 1955-75).
In the Paradiso (1321), the highest of Dante’s heavens is the Empyrean, the tenth heaven. It contains God’s Court, seen as a many-petaled rose.
Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, and Sydney Greenstreet star together in two movies, The Maltese Falcon (1941) and Across the Pacific (1942). Both were directed by John Huston.
