Despite rumors and urban legends to the contrary, it is not the responsibility of the Secret Service to keep the President from getting drunk.
Andrew Johnson developed a reputation for being an alcoholic after showing up at his vice-presidential inauguration drunk. In reality, Johnson rarely imbibed and not to excess, but was feeling sick that day and was told to drink some whiskey as a cure. He evidently overdid it. Johnson also was the first president to be impeached.
Richard Nixon would almost certainly have been impeached - that is, accused by the House of Representatives - and removed from office after trial by the Senate, had he not resigned in August 1974 after the House Judiciary Committee voted for articles of impeachment due to his role in the Watergate scandal. Bill Clinton was the second President to be impeached, in 1998. He was acquitted in a trial before the U.S. Senate, presided over by the Chief Justice of the United States as set forth in the Constitution, early in 1999.
Or laid.
In recognition of the inconvenient fact that he had actually been acquitted of corruption at his criminal trial (because his partner clammed up on the witness stand), US District Court Judge (Florida southern district) Alcee Hastings was removed from office but not stripped of his ability to hold future federal office after his 1989 impeachment conviction. He promptly played the race card and successfully ran for the House in 1992, where he has sat since.
Yes, but it was much smaller than it now is, and it was merged with several smaller islands. Île Notre-Dame was completely artificial.
According to legend, the Battle of Hastings was lost when King Harold looked up at the sky just in time for it to catch an arrow in his eye. His body was identified on the field by his consort Edith Swan Neck (referred to in some accounts as his “danewife”, meaning “common law” or “long time concubine”- they were not legally married [he had a wife from whom he was estranged]) and his mother offered a huge ransom but William the Conqueror refused, burying him on a cliff instead as part of a Viking ritual*.
*William the Conqueror was not technically a Viking but his ancestors were.
William the Conqueror died due to a bowel infection after he impaled himself on the pommel of his saddle. Despite his doctors’ efforts – no, make that because of his doctors’ efforts (they bled him enough to kill him), he died, his abdomen horribly swollen. At his funeral, William – a large and, at the time of death, corpulent man – was too big to fit into the sarcophagus. Those present tried to push it in; the swollen body burst, filling the church with a stench that could not be masked by the incense. The funeral was quickly concluded.
Sarcophagus MacAbre is the name of a vulture in Walt Kelly’s Pogo comic strip. Sarcophagus works as a mortician.
A vulture appears behind Ted Striker (Robert Hays) in the cockpit as he’s trying to muster his courage before landing the jinxed jet airliner in the 1980 movie spoof Airplane! (he didn’t have the fish).
In order to get the phrase “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn” into the movie, in violation of the Hays Code, the producers of Gone With The Wind had to pay a $5,000 fine.
The Ohio Revised Code, the compilation of all criminal and civil law passed by the General Assembly, was last thoroughly revised in 1953, the sesquicentennial of Ohio statehood.
The racehorse General Assembly, sired by Secretariat and named after another part of the United Nations, and a descendant of Native Dancer on his dam’s side, ran second to Spectacular Bid in the 1978 Champagne Stakes and Laurel Futurity and in the 1979 Kentucky Derby and Marlboro Cup. He later that year set a track record in the Travers Stakes at Saratoga that still stands.
Potato chips are commonly thought to have been invented in 1853 by the chef at the Saratoga Springs resort in New York, after a diner complained that the fried potatoes were too soggy. In reality, recipes for fried potato “shavings” have been found dating to 1832 in the U.S., and believed to date even earlier than that in England.
Pringles brand potato chips (or “crisps”, depending on the country and its truth in advertising laws), made by Procter & Gamble and sold in tubes, are in the shape of a hyperbolic paraboloid, according to company literature. The brand is far more popular outside the US than in its homeland, and is available in numerous local flavors depending on the country of sale. The official inventor of the tube, Fredric Baur, was, according to his final wishes, buried in one of them after his cremation.
Oscar Gamble, an outfielder for the White Sox and Yankees, while certainly a good ballplayer, is best known for his oversized afro.
In the Broadway musical Hair the characters Claude and Berger advocate growing hair “long, straight, curly, fuzzy. snaggy, shaggy, ratty, matty, oily, greasy, fleecy, shining, gleaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen, knotted, polka-dotted, twisted, beaded, braided, powdered, flowered, and confettied, bangled, tangled, spangled, and spaghettied.”
In the movie Clueless Cher and Dion use the term “Monet” to describe something that “seen from far away, it’s okay; but up close, it’s a big ol’ mess”, a reference to the paintings of impressionist Claude Monet.
Cher played a Federal public defender for a homeless Washington, D.C. man played by Liam Neeson in Suspect, a 1987 political thriller. It was one of Neeson’s first major roles.
(Back to post 5515: Oscar Gamble, according to Wiki, “is quoted to have given his advice about [pro baseball] with this famous quote: ‘They don’t think it be like it is, but it do.’”)
Liam Neeson recently dropped out of the on again/off again Stephen Spielberg film bio of Abraham Lincoln that’s been in pre-production for years but never gets any closer to production; front runners for the role now include (if it’s ever made) Tom Hanks and George Clooney, both of whom are maternal relatives of Lincoln (Clooney’s mother being among Lincoln’s closest living relatives- her g-g-g-grandmother having been a full sister of Lincoln’s mother, Nancy Hanks).
Not for play:
(Back to post 5515: Oscar Gamble, according to Wiki, “is quoted to have given his advice about [pro baseball] with this famous quote: ‘They don’t think it be like it is, but it do.’”)
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Oscar Gamble owns two townhouses directly across the street from my front door- just thought I’d mention because how often does it come up?
Abraham Lincoln did not get along particularly well with his father, Thomas. Many historians think the teenage Lincoln resented his father for keeping his wages (although this was common at the time) and was later embarrassed by his illiteracy and rough frontier manner, although there may have been other issues as well. Although Abraham was not far away at the time his father died, he did not attend the funeral.