Okay, back to King Crimson, already!
Following the 1971 Islands tour, every member of King Crimson except guitarist Robert Fripp quit, in order to form a new band called Snape, with British blues legend Alexis Korner.
King George VI of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland was the father of Queen Elizabeth II, who was born this day in 1926.
HMS Queen Elizabeth is under construction as the lead ship of the two-ship Queen Elizabeth class of Royal Navy aircraft carriers. The other will be HMS Prince of Wales. Together they will replace the current Invincible class.
Queen Elizabeth II is currently the third longest-reigning monarch of Great Britain and the United Kingdom. If she is still reigning on May 12, 2011, she will surpass the reign of George III (currently second) and if she is still reigning on September 10, 2015, when she is 89, she will surpass Queen Victoria as both the longest-reigning monarch and as the longest-reigning female monarch.
The highest-rated episode on “the Tonight Show” was the December 17, 1969 episode on which Tiny Tim married 17 year old Victoria “Miss Vicky” Budinger.
The couple had one daughter, Tulip, before splitting up.
Before settling on the name Tiny Tim for the crippled child in “A Christmas Carol”, Charles Dickens reputedly considered Little Larry, Puny Pete, and Small Sam.
In Snow White and the Three Stooges, the part of Snow White was played by Olympic figure skating champion Carol Heiss. It was her only acting role.
Gandalf the Grey, slain while defeating the Balrog of Moria in The Lord of the Rings, is sent back to Middle-earth as Gandalf the White to finish the task of defeating Sauron.
In the National Lampoon parody Bored of the Rings, Goodgulf the wizard, friend of Arrowroot and Arrowshirt, defeats the Ballhog.
Gulf Oil Corporation sold several grades of gasoline, including the lower-octane Gulftane, Good Gulf regular, Gulf No-Nox premium, and Gulf Super Unleaded. For a few years, the company used horseshoes to indicate the “extra kick” of No-Nox. Gulf Oil later merged with Standard Oil of California and its stations were rebranded as Chevron.
A single chevron indicates the rank of private, double chevron the rank of corporal and triple chevron the rank of sergeant, and triple chevron with 3 semi-circles beneath the rank of master sergeant in the U.S. Army.
Texaco (who merged with Chevron in 2001) was the sole sponsor of the Metropolitan Opera’s the radio broadcasts for 63 years. They also sponsored Texaco Star Theatre, which was the show that gave Milton Berle the nickname “Mr. Television”.
Giancarlo Menotti’s ***Amahl and the Night Visitors *** was the first opera written specifically for American television. It premiered on December 24, 1951, on NBC’s Hallmark Hall of Fame.
The Hallmark Hall of Fame was sponsored by Hallmark Cards, the largest greeting-card manufacturer in the U.S. Hallmark was founded by Joyce Hall in 1910, and is still privately owned.
Dr. Joyce Brothers won the big money on the TV show The $64,000 Question. Her subject was boxing, and although the show was later hit by scandal, Brothers claimed she had never been fed any answers. Subsequent investigations confirmed her honesty.
The $64,000 Question originated as Take It or Leave It, a CBS radio show. Contestants were asked questions that became harder in successive rounds; correct answers in the first round were worth $1 and contestants would double their winnings until the seventh round, when they could win $64.
Twelve year old Anna “Patty” Duke won $32,000 on The $64,000 question but confirmed under oath that she had been coached. (This was before she became famous for the Broadway and film productions of The Miracle Worker, a play which began as part of an episode of Playhouse 90 starring Patty “The Bad Seed” McCormack as Helen and Teresa Wright as Annie Sullivan.)
Fellow Doper** Patty O’Furniture ** joined the Board on May 20, 1999.
The Peppermint Patty was introduced by the York Candy Company, based in York, PA, in 1940.
Forced to flee Philadelphia by advancing British troops, the Continental Congress briefly made York, Pa. the de facto national capital of the infant republic; the Articles of Confederation were drafted there.