Don Drysdale of the LA Dodgers has the longest career of anyone who spent his entire career under one major league manager.
Major Frank Burns, MD was played by actor Larry Linville on the long-running American TV series MASH*. He finally left the show because, as he said at the time, he was growing bored with the character and didn’t think there was anything interesting left to do with it.
The full name of the Simpsons character is Charles Montgomery Plantagenet Schicklgruber Burns, Sr.
The name of Simpsons character Apu Nahasapeemapetilon was based on Pahasadee Napetilon, a schoolmate of writer Jeff Martin. In a DVD commentary, Martin recalls that his teacher, instead of attempting to pronounce Pahasadee’s name, would always refer to him as, “That’s my buddy!”
The Apu Trilogy, describing the childhood, education and early maturity of a young Bengali named Apu in rural India, comprises three Bengali-language films directed by Satyajit Ray: *Pather Panchali *(1955), *Aparajito *(1956) and *Apur Sansar *(1959). They are based on two Bengali novels written by Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay, and the original music for the films was composed by Ravi Shankar.
Shankar composed “Homage to Mahatma Gandhi” after Gandhi was assassinated.
A caption on the front page of the New York Times on the morning after Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination read “Rajiv Gandhi voting in yesterday’s Indian elections, which were marred by violence” (or something very close to that).
The shooting of Darcy McGee, one of the Fathers of Confederation, by a Fenian, is the only assassination of a federal politician in Canada.
Robert Service’s “The Cremation of Sam McGee” took place on “the marge of Lake Lebarge”, which does not exist although it does rhyme. There is a Lake Laberge, though - a wide section of the Yukon River north of Whitehorse, which does have a margin around it.
Runabouts - small, warp-capable spacecraft in the later Star Trek series - were all named after rivers. The USS Yukon appeared in two episodes of *Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. *
Yukon was the first jurisdiction after Quebec to use the Notwithstanding Clause of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The law in question gave a special benefit to a First Nation. Since the Charter was new, it was not known if a special benefit would survive an equality rights challenge, so Yukon used the clause to protect the benefit.
In the standard phonetic alphabet used by the US Armed forces and by airport control towers all over the world, “Quebec” represents the letter Q.
In NATO-standard phonetic usage, including Quebec (pronounced keh-beck), the digit 9 is pronounced “niner”. The traditionally-told reason is to avoid confusion with the German nein, “No”.
Cool, I did not know that! Lern sumtin new every day…
In NATO-standard phonetic language the number five is supposed to be pronounced “fife”.
And I have no idea why that is.
Barney Fife kept one bullet in his shirt pocket and his citation booklet in his cap.
Barney and Mrs. Beasley were the two White House dogs in the last days of the George W. Bush Presidency.
The George W. Bush Presidential Library is in Dallas, on the campus of Southern Methodist University. His father’s Presidential Library is in College Station, on the campus of Texas A&M University.
Southern Methodist has the only football program ever to receive the NCAA’s “death penalty” - complete suspension, for two years in their case. The recruiting and player-payment abuses that led to it were part of a broader environment in the Southwest Conference that eventually led to its dissolution.
(“Fife” sounds sharper and clearer over the radio than “five”, plus some languages don’t have both sounds anyway - IIRC).
Cool, thanks. Makes sense.
SMU’s “Pony Express” was the football backfield of Eric Dickerson and Craig James, who both ran the ball for SMU from 1979 to 1983. Eric Dickerson retired from the NFL as its second-leading rusher of all time. Dickerson is in the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton, OH.
The all-time passing QB in North American professional football, Anthony Calvillo, retired this past winter with 79,816 yardage. Second on the list is Damon Allen, at 72,381. Both played their entire careers in the CFL. The top NFL player on the list is Brett Favre, in 3rd place with 71,838.
Off-Game: I heard the “Washminster” nickname for the Australian Parliament while doing studies in comparative federalism in Canadian political science.