A dungeon was originally the room at the top of a castle tower. It was often used to house prisoners. When they started housing prisoners in basements, the term went with it.
The word “dungeon” is from medieval French donjon, a fortified tower or keep. The largest donjon in Europe was at the famed Chateau de Coucy in Picardy. The most famous lord of Coucy is probably Enguerrand VII, who is the main subject of Barbara Tuchman’s A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century. Built by Enguerrand III in the 1220s, the donjon and towers were destroyed by the retreating German army in 1917, on order of Erich Ludendorff. Historians debate whether this was done for military reasons or just for pure spite.
The Château d’Hérouville is a French 18th century château located in the village of Hérouville, in the Val d’Oise département of France, near Paris. The château was built in 1740 by “Gaudot”, an architect of the school of Rome, from the remains of an earlier 16th-century château.
Known originally for being the home of Frederic Chopin, it was later famous for its recording studio. Elton John recorded three studio albums there including “Honky Château”, which is the nickname for the Château d’Herouville. Other acts who recorded there were The Grateful Dead, The Bee Gees, Jethro Tull, and David Bowie.
During his lifetime, Frank Zappa (1940-1993) released a total of 62 albums; this list includes those albums credited to the Mothers of Invention. After his death, the Zappa Family Trust has released another 57, for a total of 119 albums.
Zappa’s group was called “The Mothers” when they were signed to a recording contract. The record company insisted they change their name because it was part of an obscenity (Motherf—). Zappa added “of Invention” to address their complaint, but fans of the band usually ignore the two extra words.
Frank Vincent Zappa was born on December 21, 1940. He shared a birthday with war criminal and UN Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim (1918), classical musician Michael Tilson Thomas (1944), actor Samuel L. Jackson (1948) and tennis star Chris Evert (1954).
Kurt Waldheim was banned from entering the United States in 1987, while he was President of Austria, after it was discovered that he had served with Nazi forces during World War II.
Of his first four seasons in the NFL, LA Rams quarterback Jim Everett led his team to the playoffs in 3 of those seasons, in 1986, 1988, and 1989. He missed the playoffs in 1987.
During the 1989 playoffs, Everett had been sacked many times. Against the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC Championship game, which San Francisco won handily 30-3, Everett was repeatedly sacked. At one point in the game Everett dropped back to pass. Facing a heavy pass rush but having not even been touched, Everett expected to be sacked and he tucked his legs under him and fell to the ground.
The play became known as Everett’s “phantom sack”
On April 6, 1994, Everett was being interviewed by Jim Rome, who, because in part of the phantom sack, had been calling Everett as “Chris Everett” in a reference to Chris Evert and questioning the QB’s manhood. Everett dared Rome to do it again, Rome did, and Everett tossed aside the table between them and pushed Rome down to the floor.
I remember watching that interview!
In play: The Los Angeles Rams pro football team started in Cleveland as the Cleveland Rams in 1937. The first year the team finished with a record of 1-10, the first of seven consecutive sub-.500 seasons. But in 1945, the Rams finished with a regular-season record of 9-1 and went to win the NFL championship.
The team then moved to Los Angeles.
Grover Cleveland, the only person to have served two non-consecutive terms as President of the United States, was an informal advisor to President Theodore Roosevelt after retirement. The two had worked together well in Albany on a bipartisan basis when Cleveland, a Democrat, was Governor of New York and Roosevelt, a Republican, was a reform-minded state legislator.
Grover Cleveland was the only Democratic president between the Civil War (not counting Andrew Johnson as he was technically president as a member of the National Union party) and Woodrow Wilson’s inauguration in 1913.
Grover, one of the “Sesame Street Muppets,” has been a regular character on Sesame Street since that show’s second season, in 1970, though earlier versions of the Grover Muppet (under different names, or unnamed) date back to 1967.
Grover was originally performed by Muppeteer Frank Oz (and his voice is similar to another Oz character, Yoda from the Star Wars films); with Oz’s retirement from the Muppets, Grover is now performed by Eric Jacobson.
In addition to his Muppet and Star Wars work, Frank Oz directed the con-artist comedy Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. He also played a corrupt Philadelphia cop in Trading Places (he’s the one who plants PCP in Winthorpe’s clothing at the police station) and a principled lawyer in Knives Out (who reads the patriarch’s will to the greedy, dysfunctional family).
Frank Oz can be seen in many John Landis films, with cameos in An American Werewolf in London and The Blues Brothers
During the production of The Wizard of Oz, when the wardrobe department was looking for a coat for Frank Morgan (Prof. Marvel / The Wizard), it decided it wanted one that looked like it had once been elegant but had since “gone to seed.” They visited a second-hand store and purchased an entire rack of coats, from which Morgan, the head of the wardrobe department and director Victor Fleming chose one they felt gave off the perfect appearance of “shabby gentility.” One day, while he was on set in the coat, Morgan idly turned out one of the pockets and discovered a label indicating that the coat had been made for L. Frank Baum. Mary Mayer, a unit publicist for the film, contacted the tailor and Baum’s widow, who both verified that the coat had at one time been owned by the author of the original “Wizard of Oz” books. After the filming was completed, the coat was presented to Mrs. Baum.
Frank Oz’s birth surname was Oznowicz. He was born in Hereford, England, in 1944, where his parents moved after fighting the Nazis as part of the Dutch Brigades. Oz’s Dutch-Polish father, Isidore Oznowicz, was Jewish, and his Flemish mother was Catholic. After relocating to Belgium, the family moved to California when Oz was five. The parents were both puppeteers, with his father serving as president of the Puppeteers of America.
Hereford, England is a city that lies between Gloucester and Worcester. The National School of Blacksmithing is located there. It is the oldest established Blacksmithing college in the UK, and is also the largest facility for training smiths in Europe.
The Hereford is a British breed of beef cattle originally from Herefordshire in England. The breed was first exported to the United States in 1817. Known for its distinctive white faces and red bodies, the Hereford is one of the most popular beef-producing breeds in the world.
Black Angus is the most common breed of beef cattle in the US. Besides Herefords, other beef cattle breeds include Charolais, Simmental, and Red Angus.
Black Angus is a Scottish breed of small beef cattle. It derives from cattle native to the counties of Aberdeen, Banff, Kincardine and Forfar (now Angus) in north-eastern Scotland. Black Angus is also called Aberdeen Angus.
Charolais is a French breed of taurine beef cattle that originates in and is named for the Charolais area in eastern France.
Simmental is a Swiss breed of cattle named after the Simmental valley in the canton of Bern in Switzerland.
Red Angus is an international breed of beef cattle derived from the Scottish Black Angus population and is identical to it besides the red coat. Red Angus are registered separately from black Angus cattle in Australia, Canada, and the US.
Angus Young, the lead guitarist for the band AC/DC, dropped out of school at the age of 15, going to work as a typesetter at a men’s magazine called ‘Ribald’, not knowing he would soon be a member of one of the biggest rock n roll bands on the planet.