The Brown Derby Restaurant opened in 1934 in Toughkenamon, Pennsylvania.
The Kentucky Derby has been run every year since 1875. It’s this Saturday, always on the first Saturday in May.
The only jockey to win the USA Triple Crown of the Kentucky Derby, The Preakness and the Belmont Stakes twice, with two different horses, was Eddie Arcaro in 1941 riding Whirlasway and 1948 riding Citation.
The fastest time ever run in the Kentucky Derby (at its present distance) was set in 1973 at 1 minute 59.4 seconds when Secretariat broke the record set by Northern Dancer in 1964.
Secretariat’s Derby win in record time was exceptional also because each quarter-mile split was faster than the previous one. Secretariat was accelerating throughout the entire race.
The “Bunion Derby” was an early supermarathon race in 1928 with the goal to run from Los Angeles to New York City (obviously, with stops along the way). 199 runners entered; only 55 finished. Andy Payne won the event with a combined time of just over 573 hours.
The race was run in the opposite direction the next year. Only one runner, Harry Abrams, completed both races.
The Cannonball Baker Sea-To-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash, widely known simply as the Cannonball Baker or Cannonball Run, was an unofficial, if not illegal, automobile race run five times in the 1970s from New York City and Darien, Connecticut, to the Portofino Inn in Redondo Beach, California. It commemorated Erwin “Cannonball” Baker’s multiple record runs in the early 20th century, including a 53.5 hour trip in 1933 in a Graham-Paige model 57 Blue Streak 8.
The Cannonball Run (1981) was Bert Convy’s final feature film.
Characters named Ernie and Bert appear in the film It’s a Wonderful Life as a taxi driver and a policeman, respectively, but those behind Sesame Street claim that it is merely a coincidence.
In It’s a Wonderful Life, the scene on the bridge where Clarence saves George was filmed on a back lot on a day where the temperature was 90 degrees Fahrenheit. This is why James Stewart is visibly sweating in a few scenes.
After a series of movie flops, James Stewart returned to the stage to star in Mary Coyle Chase’s Harvey, which had opened to nearly universal praise in November 1944, as Elwood P. Dowd, a wealthy eccentric living with his sister and niece, and whose best friend is an invisible rabbit as large as a man. Dowd’s eccentricity, especially the friendship with the rabbit, is ruining the niece’s hopes of finding a husband. While trying to have Dowd committed to a sanatorium, his sister is committed herself while the play follows Dowd on an ordinary day in his not-so-ordinary life. Stewart took over the role from Frank Fay and gained an increased Broadway following in the unconventional play. The play, which ran for nearly three years with Stewart as its star, was successfully adapted into a 1950 film, directed by Henry Koster, with Stewart as Dowd and Josephine Hull as his sister, Veta. Bing Crosby was the first choice but he declined.
Actor Jim Parsons “came out” (though he never was really in) in a 2012 New York Times interview for his starring role in the Broadway play Harvey.
Hal Chase was one of the best first basemen in the early years of the 20th century, but developed a reputation for betting on and throwing games. Though he was never formally shown to have bet on games, there was enough evidence to have him informally banned, as the president of the National League ordered the NY Giants to release him and warned other teams not to pick him up.
Chase was known as a great fielder, which was one way he was able to throw games. Infielders are trained to throw the to bag when the first baseman is playing away from it; the first basement gets to the bag and grabs the ball. Chase would hold back when heading for the bag; the ball would sail past him without him touching it, making it an error for the person who threw the ball, and putting the runner on base.
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Salmon P. Chase served variously as Governor of Ohio, U.S. Senator from Ohio, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and Chief Justice of the United States. President Abraham Lincoln appointed him to the latter two posts.
Lincoln’s hat size was 7 1/8. His shoe size is normally listed as between 12 and 14.
Robert Todd Lincoln’s beautiful Vermont country house Hildene is now open for tours and rentals.
Brooks Brothers clothiers, the oldest in the US, has outfitted 39 Presidents,
including Lincoln. President Obama wore Brooks Brothers coat, scarf and gloves
during his last inauguration.
The Brooks Brothers riot is the term coined to describe the demonstration at a meeting of election canvassers in Miami-Dade County, Florida on November 19, 2000, during a recount of votes made during the 2000 United States presidential election. The name refers to a traditional brand of suits associated with conservative business dress, reinforcing the allegation that the corporately attired protesters sporting “Hermès ties” were astroturfing, which is to say that they were not, in fact, just ordinary local citizens expressing their concerns about counting practices. Hundreds of “paid GOP crusaders” descended upon South Florida to protest the state’s recounts, with at least half a dozen of the demonstrators at Miami-Dade paid by George W. Bush’s recount committee. Several of these protesters were identified as Republican staffers and a number later went on to jobs in the Bush administration.
The Zoot Suit Riots in 1943 in Los Angeles were fought between white servicemen and civilian Mexican-American gangs who wore zoot suits as an early form of gang colors. The servicemen were annoyed to see people with the audacity not only to be brown and be healthy-looking young men not in uniform, but to wear clothing that appeared wasteful of cloth needed for the war effort.
“Zoot Suit Riot” was a 1997 song by the American ska-swing band the Cherry Poppin’ Daddies.