The middle name of Michael Dukakis, former governor of Massachusetts and the failed 1988 Democratic presidential candidate, is Stanley (no one calls him Stan, though). He now teaches at Northeastern University. He was mentioned last year as a possible temporary appointee to the late Ted Kennedy’s U.S. Senate seat, but Kennedy loyalist Paul Kirk got the gig instead.
Stanley was also the first name of Barack Obama’s mother, Stanley Ann Dunham Obama Soetoro, although she went by Ann.
“Stanley Steamer” was a general term applied to steam-driven automobiles produced by the Stanley Motor Carriage Company from 1902 through 1924. Improvements to internal-combustion engines eventually led to the demise of the Stanley Steamer.
Stanley Steemer provides carpet-cleaning services for both residential and business clients. It was founded in 1947 and is headquartered in Dublin, Ohio.
The Wendy’s fast food corporation is headquartered in Dublin, Ohio. Founder Dave Thomas was an adopted child, and he was a major supporter of adoption organizations in the U.S.
Gen. George H. Thomas earned the nickname “The Rock of Chickamauga” by his steadfast stand at the September 1863 battle in northern Georgia. Perhaps his best-known statue stands in Thomas Circle, not far from the White House in Washington, D.C. He is buried in Troy, N.Y., the hometown of his wife.
Author and cynic Ambrose Bierce fought at the Battle of Chickamaugua, which was the title of one of the stories that helped make his reputation. Now, he’s better known for “An Occurrance at Owl Creek Bridge” and The Devil’s Dictionary.
Carlos Fuentes’ novel The Old Gringo, later a film with Gregory Peck, speculates about what happened to Ambrose Bierce after his disappearance in Mexico during a revolution led by Pancho Villa.
Frances “Pancho” Barnes was born to a wealthy California family, but chose to become a barnstormer and stunt pilot. She later bought 80 acres of land and built a restaurant and dude ranch which catered to the test pilots and crew from the nearby Muroc airfield. Some of her exploits are related in the book and movie The Right Stuff.
Pancho Barnes was the granddaughter of Thaddeus Lowe, who pioneered the use of hot air balloons as reconnaissance platforms for the Union Army in the Civil War. His work was vital to Union success in a number of battles in Virginia and Maryland.
The Montgolfier Brothers were the first confirmed hot air balloonists (though there are other claimants to the title). They began by sending up roosters and geese and later sheep in tethered balloons before finally ascending themselves before (and with partial financing from) Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette; Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin both witnessed their flights (from the ground).
The “author” of the Hardy Boys books was Stratemeyer Syndicate’s house name “Franklin W. Dixon.”
[del]Montgolfieres were used in the siege of Paris in 1870-1, in the Franco-Prussian War, for sending mail and even for evacuating wounded French soldiers. Eventually defeated, resentful Parisian workers who had formed the National Guard overthrew the city’s (and country’s) government and ruled briefly as the destructive, bloody Commune.[/del]
Mickey Rooney came to fame in the 1930’s playing the intolerably annoying boy Andy Hardy in a series of film shorts.
Fontaine Fox wrote and illustrated the popular “Toonerville Folks” comic panel, best known for the Toonerville Trolley and characters like the Terrible Tempered Mr. Bang, the Powerful Katrinka, and Mickey “Himself” McGuire. McGuire was the subject of a series of silent films in the 1920s. The producer, however, didn’t want to pay Fox, so in order to avoid a copyright infringement suit, he had the young actor in the films use the stage name “Mickey McGuire.” When the series ended, Mcguire changed his name to “Mickey Rooney.”
Mickey Rourke costars as the villain in Iron Man 2, a sequel based on the Marvel comics and released today in the U.S.
The villain in the first Iron Man was Obadiah Stane was portrayed by Jeff Bridges. Jeff Bridges also starred in such movies as K-PAX, Seabiscuit, and The Men Who Stare at Goats.
Jeff Bridges also played “the Dude,” the Sixties-burnout lead character in the Coen Brothers’ movie The Big Lebowski, which has long been a cult favorite. He was asked about it on Oscar night recently and said he would be happy to be remembered for that role alone.
“The Adventures of Spin and Marty” was a series of stories shown on The Mickey Mouse Club, telling the adventures of a pair of boys – one all-American, the other stuck-up British – on a western dude ranch, the Triple R.
Ben and Me is about Amos the mouse, who came up with all of Benjamin Franklin’s best ideas. It is part of Robert Lawson’s series of children’s books about the animals associated with famous people, including Captain Kidd’s Cat, Paul Revere and I (about his horse), and I Discover Columbus (about the explorer’s parrot).
Christopher Columbus was survived by two sons. His legitimate son, Don Diego, followed in his father’s footsteps and became an admiral and governor of the Indies; he built a mansion in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic that still stands. Columbus’s younger and illegitimate son, Fernando, spent his sizeable inheritance* assembling what was probably the largest private library in Europe at the time- 15,000 volumes of more than 1,800 titles; Erasmus and other famous scholars were his guests in using the library and Thomas More’s library included many books copied from its catalog. Much of it still survives and is housed in Seville.
*Contrary to popular history, Columbus did not die broke but very well off; he just did not profit as much from the New World as he felt he should have.