The Jazz Singer was Hollywood’s first feature-length movie that included talking and singing. Al Jolson starred in this version, which was based upon a play of the same name. Later remakes featured Danny Thomas (1952) and Neil Diamond (1980).
The Moon of Baroda Diamond was worn by Maria Theresa (only female Holy Roman Empress in her own right) and by Marilyn Monroe.
Robbie Robertson produced Neil Diamond’s “Beautiful Noise” album, and invited him to appear in “The Last Waltz.”
Waltzing Mathilda is sometimes referred to as the unofficial Australian national anthem.
Harry “Breaker” Morant and Peter Handcock, Australian soldiers serving under British command during the Boer War, were executed for war crimes on Feb. 27, 1902. Many of their countrymen consider them to have been railroaded; the movie Breaker Morant presents a fictionalized portrayal of their wartime service, trial and execution.
A low-budget kung fu/trucker flick called “Breaker, Breaker” gave Chuck Norris his first lead role in an American movie.
George W. Norris (R-Nebr.) was one of only six U.S. senators to vote against the declaration of war on Germany in 1917. Never afraid to do what he felt to be in the national interest despite the opposition of many of his constituents, he was one of the eight senators featured in John F. Kennedy’s Profiles in Courage.
Jeannette Rankin of Wyoming, the first woman to serve in the House, cast votes against US entry into both World Wars. In 1941, hers was the only such vote.
Dr. Gregory House, an American, is played by British actor Hugh Laurie, who is primarily known over there for silly comedy roles.
Arthur Rankin and Jules Bass began a film production company specializing in stop-motion animation in 1960. Later known as Rankin/Bass Productions, the team would go on to produce such holiday specials as Frosty the Snowman, Little Drummer Boy, and, of course, Rudolph.
The eight tiny reindeer in Clement Moore’s [A Visit from St Nicholas* are:
Dasher
Dancer
Prancer
Vixen
Comet
Cupid
Donder
Blitzen
(And Olive, the other reindeer …)
The airliner Jimmy Stewart saved from crashing in “No Highway in the Sky” was a Reindeer.
Jimmy Stewart was a bomber pilot in WWII.
Jon Stewart was born Jonathan Stewart Leibowitz in New York City, and grew up in Lawrenceville, New Jersey.
In “Animal House,” Otter got a group of Dickinson College sorority girls to join him and his friends on a road trip by pretending to be the grieving fiance of recently deceased Dickinson student Fawn Leibowitz.
Lawrenceville is the home of Rider University, originally named Trenton Business College, and a very important place in my family. It includes the former Westminster Choir College.
By which I mean: The motto of Faber College in Animal House, based on the U. of Oregon, was “Knowledge is Good”.
Countless bands have recorded “Louie, Louie,” but the most popular version was by the Kingsmen, a garage rock band from Portland, Oregon.
Although a 1985 effort to make “Louie, Louie” the official state song of Washington failed, the legislature nonetheless declared an official “Louie Louie Day”.
There is a movement afoot to change Missouri’s official state motto from The Show Me State to The Great Rivers State.
Although “The game is afoot” is a quote usually associated with Sherlock Holmes, in fact Arthur Conan Doyle borrowed it from Shakespeare’s “Henry V”.