Animation Fun Facts for July 1, 2017

Birthdays: Louis Bleriot, Tommy Dorsey, George Sand, Charles Laughton, James Cagney, Princess Diana, Twyla Tharp, Carl Lewis, Jamie Farr, Sidney Pollack, Wally "Famous"Amos, Estee Lauder, Debbie Harry (Blondie), Genevieve Bujold, Karen Black, Dan Ackroyd. Andre Crouch, Pamela Anderson is 50, Liv Tyler is 40, Olivia DeHavilland is 101!

1851- James MacNeil Whistler applied to West Point Military Academy. After failing entrance exams he washes out and concentrates on becoming one of the most celebrated painters of the century. He later joked:" If silicon was a gas, I’d be a major general by now!"

150 YEARS AGO 1867-HAPPY CANADA DAY- By treaty Her Majesties North American Colonies of Upper and Lower Canada, Maritimes, Prince Rupert Land and diverse other holdings are incorporated as the Autonomous Dominion of Canada. 

1933- Mickey’s Gala Premiere, Mickey short with Joe Grant’s caricatures of famous Hollywood celebrities.

1941- Animation director Tex Avery stormed out of the Looney Tunes Studio when Jack Warner ordered cuts in his Bugs Bunny cartoon, THE HECKLING HARE. 40 feet was trimmed from the end of the cartoon by Leon Schlesinger who agreed with Mr. Warner it had one too many endings, involving Bugs and the Dog falling through space endlessly. Leon put him on a four-week suspension without pay, but Avery had already lined up a directing gig at MGM.

1941- THE FIRST TV COMMERICAL -During the live coverage of a Brooklyn Dodgers-Philadelphia Phillies baseball game the first FCC sanctioned television commercial aired. It was for the Bulova Watch Company.

1945- Bill Mauldin's wartime comic strip "Willie and Joe' ends it's run along with the European front line edition of Stars and Stripes magazine. Charles Schulz of Peanuts fame said no one could draw mud like Bill Maudlin. Mauldin was once chewed out by General Blood & Guts Patton for making his GIs so slovenly and cynical. He felt it was a negative image of the American Fighting Man. Seesh...everybody’s a critic!

1945- NY Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia read the Sunday comics section over the radio because of a newspaper strike.

1956- The film Earth Vs. The Flying Saucers premiered. Effects by Ray Harryhausen.

1970- Hanna & Barbera’s attempt at a primetime animated series "Where’s Huddles?"

1970- The Xerox Company of Connecticut were convinced to open a new computer science lab on the west coast near Stanford University, It’s called Palo Alto Research Center, or Xerox PARC. In 9 years PARC will develop laser-printing, color graphics,  GUI’s, Graphics User Interface, windows, cursor point and click, and Ethernet.

1972- Ms. Magazine started publication.

1981- The Wonderland Murders. Over-endowed porn star Johnny Holmes (aka Johnny Wadd) was implicated in a gang murder. His Los Angeles home was known to be involved in drug dealing. This day four drug dealers were found there beaten to death there , The Wonderland Gang. Holmes was picked up and tried as an accomplice but was acquitted. Holmes died in 1988, and his story became the basis for Marc Walberg’s character in Boogie Nights.

1996- the movie Dinosaur Valley Girls premiered.

1998- Barbara Streisand married James Brolin.