Hamilton Burger was the fictional district attorney, played by William Tallman, in a 12-year run of the Perry Mason Show, in the 50s and 60s. The ill-fated Burger had a spectacular streak of failed prosecutions, as Mason would goad spectators in the back of the courtroom to suddenly leap to their feet and melodramatically admit to being the real but completely unsuspected murderer.
Alexander Hamilton served on Gen. George Washington’s military staff during the American Revolution but yearned for a combat command. Washington finally gave him one, and Hamilton won glory during the Fall 1781 Yorktown campaign. He was later painted in uniform as a Continental Army officer.
Painted horses used by warring Indian tribes were more than just naturally of Pinto coloration. Plains Indians, particularly the Comanches, would paint their horses with elaborate colorful patterns before going into battle, the same as they would paint their own faces and bodies,.
Vance DeBar “Pinto” Colvig was a voice actor known for originating the voices of several cartoon characters, including Goofy, and two of the Seven Dwarves, Sleepy and Grumpy.
Tardar Sauce was one of a litter of four kittens born to a calico mother and a father of an unknown breed at the home of her owner, Tabatha Bundesen. The Bundesens say that Tardar Sauce’s face appears grumpy because the feline has a form of dwarfism. She and her brother Pokey were born to normal parents with “a flat face, bubble eyes, and a short tail”. Tardar Sauce is undersized and has hind legs that “are a bit different”. Although she has a “grumpy” appearance and is called “Grumpy Cat”, according to the Bundesens, 99% of the time she is a “normal kitty”.
The Poky Little Puppy is the biggest-selling children’s book of all time, outselling any Dr. Seuss title. Written by Janette Sebring Lowrey and illustrated by Gustaf Tenggren, it was first published in 1942 as one of the first twelve books in the Simon & Schuster Little Golden Books. I acquired my copy if 1942 or 43, and it might have been a first edition, but was quickly mutilated.
Harrison Ford played Det. John Book in the 1985 crime thriller Witness. The movie includes one of Danny Glover’s earliest screen appearances.
The Edsel was an automobile that was manufactured by the Ford Motor Company in 1958–1960. Ford had expected to make significant inroads into the market share of both General Motors and Chrysler and close the gap between itself and GM in the domestic American automotive market. It failed miserably and became a popular symbol for commercial failure.
Phil Sayer was the voice of the London Underground, including the famous comment “mind the gap” to alert passengers that there was a gap between the threshold of the cars and the station platform
He died of cancer last spring. His wife announced it on their Facebook page, concluding with: “We are sorry to announce that this service terminates here.”
On September 27, 1854, the* SS Arctic* sank off the coast of Newfoundland. Only 88 people survived out of more than 400 on board. The paddle steamer was bound for New York. When Captain Luce ordered the lifeboats launched, members of the crew and the more able-bodied male passengers filled the few lifeboats. Most of the rest went down with the ship. All the women and children on board perished.
“Zuckerbaby” is a 1985 German film, starring Marianne Sägebrecht, the actress best known for her cult role in “Bagdad Cafe”. In Zuckerbaby, she is a commuter who falls in love with the voice that announces trains in the Berlin U-bahn. It is a delightful comedy, in which none of the women on board the train perish.
In Rocky, Sylvester Stallone trains by punching sides of beef.
There have been three popes named Sylvester, and one anti-Pope. One of the popes could also be considered an anti-Pope, but isn’t. The first one was in the fourth century and the last in the twelfth century.
Little is known about Sylvester I, who reigned in the fourth century. His name has come to be associated with the fictitious “Donation of Constantine.”
Sylvester II reigned at the turn of the first millennium and was the first French pope. He may have been the first westerner to use Arabic numbers and decimals.
Sylvester III only reigned for two months, from January to March 1045. He was elected after Pope Benedict IX was driven from Rome. When Benedict returned two months later, Sylvester resigned. Some consider him to have been an anti-Pope, but he is still listed on official Vatican lists of popes.
Sylvester IV was clearly an anti-Pope, installed by the Emperor while Pope Paschal II was away from Rome. Paschal returned the day after Sylvester’s installation. Sylvester promptly resigned.
“Tweetie Pie” starring Tweetie and Sylvester was the first animated short other than one made by Disney or MGM to win an Oscar in that category. Together Disney and MGM won the first 15 Awards.
On Growing Pains, Mike’s best friend was a boy called Boner. It later came out that his full name was Richard Milhous Stabone, and he and Mike had the following exchange:
Mike: Now your mother talks to your dad and she says----What is your father’s first name?
Boner: Sylvester
Mike: She says—Wait a minute. Your father’s name is Sylvester Stabone?
Boner: Yeah. Who knew?
On November 18, 1928, Walt Disney’s Steamboat Willie, the first completely post-produced synchronized sound animated cartoon, was released. The cartoon is considered the debut of Mickey Mouse and his girlfriend Minnie, despite both the characters appearing several months earlier in a test screening of* Plane Crazy*. *Steamboat Willie *was the third of Mickey’s films to be produced, but was the first to be distributed because Walt Disney had, after seeing The Jazz Singer, committed himself in full to producing the first synchronized sound cartoon.
In Stephen King’s novel The Green Mile, Del’s mouse is first called Steamboat Willy after the Disney mouse until Del says the mouse told him his name was Mr. Jingles.
The TV character “Jingles”, the sidekick to Guy Madison’s Wild Bill Hickok, was played by Andy Devine. Devine, despite his education and athletic background, is best remembered for playing buffoonish, overweight comedy relief characters in such movies as the original Stagecoach and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence.
“Jingle Bells” was written by James Lord Pierpont and published under the title “One Horse Open Sleigh” in the autumn of 1857. According to the Medford Historical Society, the song was inspired by the town’s popular sleigh races during the 19th century, and was not initially associated with Christmas.
Ulysses S. Grant’s main horse during the American Civil War was named Cincinnati; Robert E. Lee’s was named Traveller.