Sir Paul McCartney is featured in the new documentary The Love We Make, about the ex-Beatle’s efforts to put together an all-star benefit concert in the wake of the 9-11 terrorist attacks.
Through his publishing company, MPL Communications, Paul McCartney owns the copyrights to the complete Buddy Holly catalogue, as well as such musicals as Grease and Guys and Dolls.
The tune to the carol “Deck the Hall with Boughs of Holly” is an ancient Welsh air. The current lyrics date back to the latter part of the 19th century and are American in origin.
The “Calling Oates” hotline has recently been established so that people can phone to hear the songs of Darryl Hall and John Oates.
Hall China, along with Homer Laughlin and Sterling, is one of the three remaining china and pottery companies still doing business in the East Liverpool, Ohio area, still known as “the Pottery Capital of the World” and once home to hundreds of potteries.
Kingston was once the capital of Canada.
Kingston, Jamaica was orignally named Colonel Barry’s Hog Crawle (after its original owner and its use). It became the capital after an earthquake destroyed the previous capital at Port Royal.
A fictionalized Port Royal, Jamaica appears in Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, starring Johnny Depp, Geoffrey Rush, Orlando Bloom and the entirely delectable Keira Knightley.
Mr Knightley is the love interest in Jane Austen’s Emma.
For years, the Long Island Railroad required most passengers to change trains at Jamaica, Queens. The allowed them to run diesel trains on Long Island, and electric trains in New York, where diesel was restricted. Even today, where there are combination diesel-electric locomotives, most routes (including the railroad’s main line) require the change.
Colin Fergeson, who shot 27 people on a Long Island Railroad car, initially had two attorneys who were going for an insanity defense based on his “black rage”–he was driven insane by years of racial prejudice. However, Fergeson insisted that he had fallen asleep, and a white guy had taken his gun and done the shootings.
Fergeson dismissed his attorneys and represented himself. His cross examinations were very bizarre, and he was found guilty on all 93 charges against him.
Before Long Island City joined the borough of Queens and thus New York City, its last mayor was a Boss Tweed-like native Irishman named Patrick Jerome Gleason, who obtained his nickname of “Battle-Axe” by chopping down a fence that had been built by the Long Island Rail Road. The fence had been intended to block traffic on Front Street where it met the 34th Street ferry, so that no member of the public could pass without first buying a train ticket.
The original name of the cloth now known as tweed was tweel, Scots for twill, it being woven in a twilled rather than a plain pattern. A traditional story has the name coming about almost by chance. About 1830, a London merchant received a letter from a Hawick firm about some tweels. The London merchant misinterpreted the handwriting, understanding it to be a trade name taken from the river Tweed that flows through the Scottish Borders textile area. Subsequently the goods were advertised as Tweed, and the name has remained ever since.
Stanley G. Weimbaum’s “A Martian Odyssey” is often credited with being the first science fiction story that showed truly alien aliens, instead of humans in funny suit (or with funny foreheads). In it, Dick Jarvis crashes on Mars, only to run in to many strange creatures, including a silicon creature that builds pyramids of its waste product (silicon dioxide) around it, a alien who hunts by making you think it’s the most attractive thing possible, and a series of drum-like miners. He also picks up a companion, Tweel, who can only learn a handful of phrases in English, but manages to make clear some fairly sophisticated concepts. Tweel is still often considered one of the most influential aliens in the genre.
“Tumbledown Dick” was the nickname for Richard Cromwell, who briefly succeeded his father Oliver as Lord Protector of England during the Commonwealth.
“Spotted dick” is NOT a venereal disease, but rather a British steamed suet pudding containing dried fruit (usually currants) commonly served with custard. “Spotted” refers to the dried fruit (which resemble spots), and “dick” may be a contraction or corruption of the word “pudding” (from the last syllable) or possibly a corruption of the word “dough” or “dog,” as “spotted dog” is another name for the same dish with the use of plums rather than currants. Another explanation offered for the word “dick” is that it comes from the German word for “thick,” which is dick.
I don’t see the connection between posts #9368 and 9369. Oh, well.
During the 1972 campaign, Committee to Reelect the President campaign aides of President Richard “Dick” Nixon, Republican of California, referred to political dirty tricks as “ratfucking.”
Although he was Canada’s third longest serving Prime Minister, Pierre Trudeau never won back-to-back majorities. In the 1972 campaign, he led his party from a majority government to a minority government.
I assume RealityChuck and I were simul-posting. No biggie.[/SIZE]
Justin Trudeau, Pierre Trudeau’s eldest son, is himself now a Liberal MP, representing part of Montreal. He was first elected in 2008.
This thread may become a candidate for Longest Trivia Dominoes" in The Guinness Book of World Records. For this reason, we’d better clear up any loose ends:
Keira Knightley, sometimes described as “a box office queen,” recently caused consternation at Toronto press conference by striding in with a Montreal Canadiens jersey (#10) slung across her shoulders.
Toronto-bred director David Cronenberg called the stunt “perverse” and expressed mock dismay that it didn’t seem to bother Knightley.
Knightley says she actually has no idea who hockey hero Guy Lafleur is, but says she expects her career to take off in Montreal after the appearance.