Happy Birthday Mr. Fripp

Photo by William Coupon

'The Case of the Hooterville Refund Fraud'

Mad Men: The Game

Just in time for the long-awaited season 5 opener of Mad Men, the Fine Bros give us this very fine choose-your-own-adventure style game.

Off by a trillion

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In this General Electric promotional photo from 1953 Mrs. Connie Hodgson, of Syracuse, N.Y., displays her figure and figures after taking on GE's Office of Air Research Automatic Computer in a mathematical challenge. She was one of a half dozen intelligent adults multiplying 8,645,392,175 by 8,645,392,175.

Mrs. Hodgson is pointing to the line where she forgot to carry a one and ended up one trillion off in her product. She shouldn't feel too bad, none of the humans — who took from 4 ½ to over 8 minutes — got the answer right. The correct answer, by the way, is 74,742,805,859,551,230,625 and was solved by OARAC in a fraction of a second.

Optical wardrobe

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Shuron is still making frames; I've worn their Ronsir Revelation and now the Sidewinder (in mod, clear plastic).
Michael Martone's "Views of My Glasses" from his book Racing in Place is an entertaining look at his own Ronsir frames.

Reading Eagle April 25, 1953

This UPI item from 1953 shows that Shuron has making "retro" frames for quite a while.
I did briefly consider pince-nez a few years ago before deciding to go back to the Ronsir style which I wore in college in the late '80s/early '90s.

Easy Living

'Batman to the Rescue'

Love. peace + soul

Sallie Blair: Barefoot Bombshell

In the October 1963 Negro Digest a reader asked "Once Sallie Blair seemed en route to the Bigtime. Her photo made Esquire's center spread, and she was booked into the de luxe supper clubs. What happened?"
The reply was "That's show business, really. However, Miss Blair now has a new act and a new look and is on the way up again."
Walter Winchell called the beautiful nightclub singer who often performed barefoot "Sex with a capital X" and "sort of like Lena Horne with baby fat." She received mentions in Dorothy Kilgallen's column as well as in often gossipy-toned items in Jet magazine.

Born Sarah Bolling Mason Hutchins in Baltimore, Md. to Sarah Mason and Carlos Hutchins (a golf pro, who in 1942 was secretary of the Citizens' Civil Rights Committee, which formed in response to the segregation of Baltimore's all-white — and better-maintained — golf courses), Sallie Blair had all the ingredients to be a much bigger star than she was. In his memoir There and Back, Jazz drummer Roy Porter claims it was an alcohol problem that held her back from greater success, though I have not seen any corroboration of this.


Jet March 5, 1953

Jet July 23, 1953

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Jet May 13, 1954

Washington Afro-American January 17, 1956

"The jaded eye I reserve for night-club openings (the one on the left that droops a little) got the shock of its life (and that's a metaphor that droops a little) the other night … it was present with the rest of me for the Sunset Strip debut of a lady who electrified an audience like nothing I've seen since the dawn of Eartha Kitt … Her name is Sallie Blair … and her opening night was a spectacle of the crazy, wonderful things that happen once in a while in show business … She came here unknown to Mocambo's ringside regulars. But before she had returned for a final encore, even Herman Hoover had heard about her … Miss Blair is going to be a star … And while I'm not a gambling man, I'd take a friendly bet on it … She looks like Abbe Lane … And when she sings, she sighs … A combination like that, I can tell you from personal experience, does more for us folks over 35 than Serutan … If I sound a little giddy about the lady, I am … This young lady could sing 'Old Gray Bonnet' and make it sound suggestive." Paul Coates, The Los Angeles Mirror-News (as reported in The Baltimore Afro-American December 22, 1956)

The Afro American January 6, 1957

Life Dec. 2, 1957 "Sallie, Season's Hit Singer" Photo by Eliot Elisofon

"She Serves a Nice Cup of Tea"
"The thrush handles the tune nicely and with class.
Strong competition looms, however, from the Tony Martin disk.
Playable for Jocks." Billboard October 27, 1958

A closeup of my copy of Hello, Tiger! Nicely arranged and conducted by Neal Hefti but with way too much reverb on Sallie's voice. My favorite tracks "Whatever Lola Wants (Lola Gets)," "When the Sun Comes Out," "Fever," "Daddy." Her LP Squeeze Me does a better job of letting her stage persona shine through as well as what Mr. Winchell was talking about.

"A striking cover (featuring the sultry thrush on a tiger-skin rug) gives this package sock display value; while the canary's sexy, intimate vocalizing makes the LP's sure-fire Jockey programming. Gal shines on a group of standards and show tunes, including the infectious 'Daddy,' 'Fever' and 'Witchcraft.'" Billboard November 3, 1958

"Ev'rything I've Got (Belongs to You)"
Hello, Tiger!

Esquire, January 1959 "A Blare for Sallie" photo by Bert Stern

This issue of Esquire is famous for Art Kane's two-page spread photograph of four decades of jazz musicians, often called "A Great Day in Harlem."

"I believe every woman should emphasize her natural attributes. If the new look coincides with her figure, she should wear it. As for myself—not this year."
Jet April 7, 1960 "Paris' new flat look has debates bustin' out all over"

Jet May 9, 1963

Still getting mentioned in Jet as late as 1978 but they've gone back to misspelling her name!

The Baltimore Afro-American February 22, 1992

Documerica

Las Vegas May 1972, Charles O'Rear

Whenever I read someone's description of their childhood and see a phrase like "It was a much simpler time" I start shouting that it was childhood — unless yours was a remarkable hardscrabble youth or you were Oliver Twist — it's usually without the stresses and woes of adulthood.

Anxious Youngsters Begin the Chase in a Greased Pig Contest at the Tennessee Consolidated Coal Company First Annual Picnic Held at a Tennessee Valley Authority Lake near Jasper and Chattanooga, Tennessee. During the Day the Miners and Their Families Gathered to Talk, Participate in Sports, Eat Barbecue, and Hear the Company President Explain Health and Retirement Benefits 08/1974 Jack Corn

Nostalgia clouds our memories and often causes us to misremember our own pasts; as Heraclitus famously noted, one cannot step into the same river twice, so it is wading into the River of Time where every second obscures the one before it.
This bit from The Sheltering Sky easily comes to mind: "… we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens a certain number of times, and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that's so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more. Perhaps not even. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless.”
Just like the '50s cannot be pigeonholed as a bland era of conformity, the Seventies were more than disco, John Travolta, bra burning, Farah Fawcett, polyester leisure suits and avocado kitchens.

Arkansas—Fort Smith, 05/1972

In the 1970s the Environmental Protection Agency hired photographers to document the ecological zeitgeist of a post-Silent Spring America from pollution to youth culture; urban decay to poverty with the Documerica program. These photos show the more mundane and true-to-life side of the decade, more how I remember it.
See more at the National Archives's Flickr page.

The Atomic Cafe

Gruss vom Krampus!

It's Krampus, ol' St. Nick's companion who punishes bad children.

Amazing strange world adventures!

I first saw Flash Gordon (maybe I'll get into Alex Raymond's comic strip or the radio show with Gale Gordon another time) — and the two following serials Flash Gordon Goes to Mars and Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe PBS in the '70s.
Before that I found at JM Fields (and still have) a large-format comic book with reprints of the comic strip's "Flash Gordon and the Vikings” story from 1968-'69.

The 1954 Flash Gordon series was filmed in Berlin and aired on the Dumont Network. Star Steve Holland was James Bama's model for Doc Savage paperback covers.

St. Petersburg Times Feb. 2, 1954
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Flash makes his first animated appearance, with other King Features stars, in 1972's The Man Who Hated Laughter.

I vaguely remember this one. No great writing and animation that looks like it took longer to film than draw.

Filmation's Flash Gordon: The Greatest Adventure of All from 1979 was based on a excellent script rejected by Dino De Laurentiis, whose version of Flash Gordon ended up with far more minuses than pluses. This was first split up into TV episodes and later in the early '80s re-edited back into full length as originally envisioned.

Punky Punkin

'We're the folks who made this country!'

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From the War Advertising Council, 1944.

'tis Autumn

A little seasonal music …

Remember, Tuesday is Soylent Green day

Can't wait till Tuesday? Order your Soylent Green now.

Wednesday is still Prince Spaghetti day.

Bill and Coo

Magic box

Japanese Nescafe commercial from the '60s.

Man o man that's Mandom

Charles Bronson reminds us that all the world loves lovers, all the world loves Mandom.
Via Scrubbles

Lancelot Link Secret Chimp: 'The Reluctant Robot' and 'The Royal Foil'

The Marx Brothers in The Story of Mankind

The Marx Brothers appeared separately in 1957's The Story of Mankind; like It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, with a huge cast, a childhood favorite.

Play the 'Wash-up Game' every day

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