Herbert Hoover was the eighth cousin once removed of Richard Nixon.
Richard Nixon’s great-grandfather fought and died in the Army of the Potomac during the July 1863 Battle of Gettysburg, and is buried in the national cemetery there.
In play: Richard Chamberlain has appeared in film adaptations of all three of Alexandre Dumas’s Musketeer novels. He played Aramis in The Three Musketeers (1973), The Four Musketeers: Milady’s Revenge (1974) and The Return of the Musketeers (1989) and Louis and Phillippe in The Man in the Iron Mask (1977).
(Side note, NOT in play: I remember seeing Richard Chamberlain’s mansion in Honolulu. Up the side of a hill, it was visible throughout the city. Big and white, I honestly thought it must be some hospital when I first arrived until someone told me what it actually was. All the time I used to ride my mountain bike past it up into the hills edging the city, back when I was in shape. The last time we were there, in 2005, I’d heard he’d sold it.)
Camille, by Alexandre Dumas, fils, has no character in it named “Camille”; the protagonist is Margarite Gauthier. The title is a misunderstanding of the French title La Dame aux camélias, which translated to “The Lady of the Camellias.” Gauthier was a high class prostitute who wore a white camelia when she was available, and a red one for the one week a month she was not.
Red and white were established as Canada’s national colours in 1921, as part of the grant of the national coat of arms by His Majesty King George V.
On 26 December 1943, in the Battle of Norway’s North Cape, the HMS Duke of York helped to sink the German battleship Scharnhorst. The Duke of York was a king George V class battleship.
Ew. That is all.
In play:
His Royal Highness Prince Andrew, the Queen’s second son, is the current Duke of York.
Andrew Dice Clay, born Andrew Clay Silverstein, is the only person to have been banned for life from MTV, for using foul language during the live broadcast of the music awards. The ban was subsequently lifted.
The 1969 single of “A Boy Named Sue”, lyrics by Shel Silverstein, was Johnny Cash’s highest charting song on the pop charts according to Billboard 100.
In the CFL, a single point is scored when the kicking team kicks the ball into the opponent’s end zone and the receiving team does not run the ball out. It’s called either a rouge or a single.
The necklace worn by Nicole Kidman in Moulin Rouge (2001) was made of real diamonds and platinum and was the most expensive piece of jewelry ever specifically made for a film. It comprised 1,308 diamonds weighing a total of 134 carats and was worth an estimated US $1 million.
Australian actress Nicole Kidman was born in Honolulu.
Honolulu native Bette Midler got her first film role as an uncredited extra in Hawaii, as a seasick ship passenger. She came to fame only after moving to New York and becoming a regular performer at the gay Continental Baths, where she partnered with Barry Manilow.
Hawaii was reportedly the first or, if not, certainly one of the earliest, movies to feature a Moog synthesizer as a scoring instrument.
Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii is the tallest mountain in the world if measured from its base at the ocean floor.
The Hawaiian-themed Christmas song “Mele Kalikimaka” was written in 1949 by Robert Alex Anderson. The song takes its title from the Hawaiian phrase, “Mele Kalikimaka,” meaning “Merry Christmas.”
Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye and Rosemary Clooney were the stars of White Christmas (1954), and each one died in real life at the age of 74.
The first issue of People Weekly magazine, with Mia Farrow on the cover, was issued on Martch 4, 1974.
ETA: Not in play but I’m leaving it here ;).
Philip Roth commented: "But this is Jewish genius on a par with the Ten Commandments. God gave Moses the Ten Commandments and then He gave to Irving Berlin ‘Easter Parade’ and ‘White Christmas.’ The two holidays that celebrate the divinity of Christ—the divinity that’s the very heart of the Jewish rejection of Christianity—and what does Irving Berlin brilliantly do? He de-Christs them both! Easter he turns into a fashion show and Christmas into a holiday about snow. Gone is the gore and the murder of Christ—down with the crucifix and up with the bonnet! He turns their religion into schlock. But nicely! Nicely! So nicely the goyim don’t even know what hit ‘em. They love it. Everybody loves it. "
Mia Farrow was born Maria de Lourdes Villiers Farrow. And, Our Lady of Lourdes is a title of the Blessed Virgin Mary invoked by Roman Catholics in honor of the Marian apparitions said to have occurred on numerous occasions in 1858 in the vicinity of Lourdes, France.