tom sito's animation almanac for may 16, 2025

Birthdays: Tamara de Lempicka, Lily Pons, Richard Tauber, Henry Fonda, Liberace- real name Wladziu Valentine Liberace, Jan Kiepura, Edmund Kirby-Smith, Gabriela Sabbatini, Thurman Thomas, Margaret Sullivan, Olga Korbut- the original adorable little Olympic Gold Medal gymnast, Debra Winger is 71, Tori Spelling, Janet Jackson, Woody Herman, Studs Terkel, Ivan Sutherland is 87, Danny Trejo is 71, Pierce Brosnan is 71.

 

1879- Dvorak’s Slavonic Dances premiered.

1929- The First Academy Awards ceremony at the Rose Ballroom of the Roosevelt Hotel. Douglas Fairbanks was the first emcee. They gave out two best picture winners. One was to William Wellman’s “Wings”. The second for “unique and artistic merit” went to F. W. Murnau’s Sunrise. The Academy originally wanted to give the Best Actor Oscar to the dog Rin Tin Tin, but they reconsidered when reminded about what kind of message that would send. So, they gave it to Emil Jannings. Janet Gaynor got the first Best Actress. The ceremony was originally a dinner party with some industry business conducted. About 270 attendees who paid $5 each. The ceremony took about 15 minutes. 

 

1946- the musical Annie Get Your Gun starring Ethel Merman premiered on Broadway.

 

1957- in a town in Pennsylvania, a failing small time businessman who had been drinking heavily, died of a heart attack at age 54. Ironically, he had just completed the first draft of a memoir about his days as a young Treasury Agent in Roaring Twenties Chicago. His name was Elliot Ness. The book - The Untouchables- became a national best seller and Hollywood turned it into a hit television series, films. Elliot Ness became the most famous lawman since Wyatt Earp.

 

1963- Gordo Cooper orbited the Earth in the last flight of Project Mercury.

 

1965 – the birthday of Spaghetti-O's later known as Spaghettios.

 

1972- Hollywood Cartoonists local# 839 voted to expel Business Agent Larry Kilty for misappropriation of funds. They called him Guilty-Kilty.

 

1975- Japanese climber Junko Tabei became the first woman to climb Mt. Everest.

 

1975 - Wings release "Listen to What the Man Said" in UK

 

1979- Shooting wraps on Steven Spielberg’s movie 1941.

 

1980 - Brian May of rock group Queen collapsed on stage with hepatitis.

 

1980 - Paul McCartney releases "McCartney II" album.

 

1981 - "Bette Davis Eyes" by Kim Carnes hits #1 for next 9 weeks. The elderly movie legend was not impressed,” Kim Carnes does not have eyes like me!” quote Bette.

 

1985 - Michael Jordan named NBA Rookie of Year.

 

1986 – "Top Gun," directed by Tony Scott and starring Tom Cruise and Kelly McGillis premiered.

 

1990- Jim Henson died of viral pneumonia at Bellevue Hospital in NYC. He was 53. 

 

1996- One of the lamest moments in TV writing. On Dallas, Pam Ewing encounters her husband Bobby Ewing in the shower although he had been dead for one year. The incident meant the entire previous season had only been a bad dream.

 

2009- Pixar’s film UP premiered.

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Tom SIto's animation almanac for May 15, 2025

Birthdays: Lyman Frank Baum, Claudio Monteverdi, Richard Avedon, James Mason, Joseph Cotten, George Brett, Jasper Johns, Anna Maria Alberghetti, Jean Renoir, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, Trini Lopez, Charles Lamont, director of Abbott & Costello Go to Mars, country singer Eddy Arnold, Chaz Palmintieri, Lainie Kazan, Disney artist Joe Grant

 

1703- Charles Perrault died. Perrault 1628-1703 was a retired minister to French King Louis XIV, who wrote stories for children under the pseudonym Mother Goose. He created Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella and Puss in Boots. 

 

1927- The Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel opened for business. Named in honor of Teddy Roosevelt.

 

1928- Walt Disney held a private sneak preview screening of his completed cartoon Plane Crazy, featuring his new star Mickey Mouse, imitating hero Charles Lindbergh. But it was a silent cartoon, and Walt had recently been impressed by the new Talking Pictures. So, he decided to hold back the release of this cartoon and push ahead with his first sound cartoon Steamboat Willie. After the wild success of Steamboat Willie, Plane Crazy was refitted with a soundtrack and released as the 4^th Mickey Mouse cartoon in 1929.

 

 

1940- The first Nylon stockings go on sale in the US.

 

 

1942- The U.S. initiated a program of wartime gas rationing. Slogans like “Is this Trip Really Necessary?” and a system of ratings vehicles with A, B & C cards pop up in a lot of gas stations for the duration. C meant a war-essential worker and you went to the head of the line to get gas. B was for police, firemen and municipal workers. A cards was the lowest status i.e. the rest of us. 

 

1946- The first Tommy’s Burger stand opened in Los Angeles.

 

1952- A big fire destroyed several stages on the Warner Bros studio lot.

 

1953- Rocky Marciano defeated Jersey Joe Walcott for the Heavyweight Championship.

 

 

1957- MGM officially closed its animation dept. laying off Hanna & Barbera and all their team. Fred Quimby retired.

 

1963 – Folk group Peter, Paul & Mary won their first Grammy for, “If I Had a Hammer”.

 

1967- Paul McCartney first met his first wife Linda Eastman.

 

1968 - Paul McCartney & John Lennon appear on the Johnny Carson Show to promote

Apple records, Joe Garagiola was the substitute host. 

 

 

1970 – A month after their breakup, The Beatles' last album, "Let It Be," is released in US.

 

2019- The Sci-Fi animated series Love, Death and Robots premiered.

tom sito's animation almanac for May 14, 2025

Birthdays: Thomas Gainsborough, Thomas Wedgewood, Francesca Annis, David Byrne, Jack Bruce, Bobby Darin, Mark Zuckerberg is 40, Tim Roth is 66, Robert Zemeckis is 73, Kate Blanchett is 55, George Lucas is 81

 

 

1787- Shortly before returning to America, the Marquis de Lafayette wrote his friend George Washington about his sponsorship of the famous quack Dr. Anton Mesmer, for whom Mesmerism is known. "Before leaving I shall obtain permission to tell Dr Mesmer’s great secrets on Animal Magnetism to you, for it is a great philosophical discovery."

 

 

1842 - 1st edition of London Illustrated News.

 

1860- The first delegation of diplomats from Japan arrived in the U.S bringing greetings from the Shogun.

 

 

1935- Griffith Park Observatory above Hollywood first opened to the public. It is featured in the James Dean movie Rebel Without a Cause.

 

1942- Walt Disney composer Frank Churchill, who wrote "Who’s afraid of the Big Bad Wolf", Whistle While you Work”, shot himself at his piano at home. He was 40. He left a suicide note that said, “Dear Caroline: My nerves have completely left me. Please forgive this awful act. It seems the only way I can cure myself. Frank.”

 

1944- In the comic strip Dick Tracy, the longtime nemesis Flattop Jones was killed.

 

1951 - Ernie Kovacs Show, debuted on NBC TV. Kovacs was a great pioneer in the video medium who created uniquely surreal images and pantomime blackout skits.

 

1955- Kepler’s Books in Menlo Park Cal, today’s Silicon Valley, was founded by peace activist Roy Kepler. Keplers’ books was a hangout for Stanford computer scientists, Hippies, and creators of the Whole Earth Catalog. The Grateful Dead and Joan Baez played there, Prof. Douglas Englebart the inventor of the computer mouse, would pop in for coffee, and kids like Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak would ride their bikes over to check out the new computer books.

 

 

1976- Keith Relf of the rock group the Yardbirds, was electrocuted while playing his guitar in his bathtub.

 

1968 - Beatles announce formation of Apple Records.

 

 

1998 - Last episode of sitcom Seinfeld on NBC. Elderly singer Frank Sinatra died shortly after watching it.

 

2016- The Disneyland Parks stopped selling Disney Dollars

tom sito's animation almanac for May 13, 2025

Birthdays: St. Sergius of Radonez 1314, Sir Arthur Sullivan, Cyrus McCormick, Stevie Wonder, George Braque, Daphne DuMaurier, Joe Louis, Richie Valens, Gil Evans, Beatrice Arthur, Dennis Rodman, Clive Barnes, animator Burnett “Burny” Mattinson, Steven Colbert is 60, Harvey Keitel is 84

 

1913- In Saint Petersburg, Igor Sikorsky invented the first airplane toilet. Later he would move to the US and invent the helicopter. Without a toilet though.

 

 

1956- Actor Montgomery Clift was disfigured in a car crash. He had to have his jaw wired until it could heal.

  

 

1963- The English adventure comic Modesty Blaise, by Peter O’Donnell and Jim Holdaway debuted.

 

1963- Marvel published the first X-Men comic book.

 

60^th Anniv.1965 - Rolling Stones recorded "Satisfaction".

 

1965- In a DC nightclub, the Ramsey Lewis Trio recorded live “The In Crowd”, one of the last jazz singles to crossover and become a hit pop song. 

 

1966 - Rolling Stones released "Paint it Black"

 

 

1971 - Grace Slick of Jefferson Airplane seriously injured in a car accident

 

1988- Legendary jazz trumpeter Chet Baker “The Prince of Cool” died when he fell off a window ledge of the Hotel Prinz Hendrik in Amsterdam. He frequently locked himself out of his room and trying to climb in a window. Heroin and cocaine were found in his system. He was 58.

 

1992- Police arrest the manager of Comic Book Heaven in Sarasota Florida on seven counts of "displaying materiel harmful to minors", i.e., comic books.

 

2006- Disney’s The Little Match Girl, directed by Roger Allers was released.

tom sito's animation almanac for May 12, 2025

Birthdays: Dolly Madison, Dante Rossetti, Frank Stella, Florence Nightingale, Tom Snyder, George Carlin, Wilfred Hyde-White, Emilio Estevez, Ron Zeigler, Farley Mowat, Ving Rhames, Bruce Boxleitner, Katherine Hepburn, Yogi Berra, Joy Batchelor

 

1934- Winnie, a Canadian black bear who had been living at the London Zoo, passed away at the ripe old age of 20. She had been at the Zoo since 1915. She was a favorite of young Christopher Robin Milne, the son of author a.a. milne. Winnie was the inspiration for Winnie the Pooh.

 

1938- “The Adventures of Robin Hood” starring Errol Flynn, Basil Rathbone, Olivia DeHaviland, Claude Rains and Eugene Paulette premiered. The swashbuckling film then cost a whopping $2 million dollars to make! The light brown mare Maid Marion rode in the movie was later bought by singing cowboy Roy Rogers and renamed Trigger.

 

1962- First day shooting on Frederico Fellini’s film 8 1/2. When screened for American Producer Joe Levine, Levine took the cigar from his mouth and growled-” Frederigo, what da hell did that movie mean? ” Fellini shrugged, “I don’t know”.

 

1963- Folksinger Bob Dylan walked out of a taping on the Ed Sullivan Show. He objected to CBS censors wanting to cut his number making fun of extra Right-Wing extremists like the John Birch Society.

 

1971 - Rolling Stone Mick Jagger weds Bianca Macias at St Tropez Town Hall.

They later divorced and Bianca became a famous habitue’ of trendy discos and fashion magazines.

 

1971- Tor Johnson died of a heart attack at age 68. Swedish wrestler turned actor, Tor’s best known role was of the bald eyeless zombie in classics like Plan Nine from Outer Space and Bride of the Monster.

 

1977- A small Westchester radio station WENW hired a thin, gawky, college grad as a DJ- Howard Stern. US radio would never be the same.

 

1995- the movie Crimson Tide opened. Directed by Tony Scott, with Denzel Washington and Gene Hackman.

 

tom sito's animation almanac for may 11, 2025

Birthdays: Salvador Dali', Jean Jerome, Chang and Eng Bunker-the original Siamese Twins-1811, Baron Munchausen, Irving Berlin, King Oliver, Martha Graham, Dr. Richard Fenyman, Mort Sahl, Foster Brooks, Denver Pyle, Henry Morgenthau, Doug McClure, Randy Quaid, Natasha Richardson, Albert Hurter, Margaret Kerry the model for Walt Disney’s Tinkerbell is 96

 

Happy Mothers Day (US) 1908. The holiday was inspiration of a West Virginia social activist named Anna Jarvis. She had 13 children herself, 4 of whom died of childhood diseases, and 5 died in the Civil War. Mrs. Jarvis had spent her life mobilizing mothers to care for their children and she wanted mothers' work to be recognized. "I hope and pray that someone, sometime, will found a memorial mothers' day commemorating her for the matchless service she renders to humanity in every field of life." She began organizing Mother’s Day Clubs as early as 1858. After her death, her daughter Anna Maria Jarvis took up the cause. She celebrated The First Mother's Day on the anniversary of her mothers passing in 1908; it became a national holiday in 1914. Mrs, Jarvis insisted the holiday idea not be commercially exploited. She hated the commercialization of Mother’s Day so much that in 1943 she circulated a petition trying to get the holiday rescinded. It failed. In 1948 Anna Maria Jarvis died broke and surrounded by store-made Mother’s Day cards and candy from fans.

 

1831- French writer Alexis De Tocqueville visited the United States.

 

 

1934- The Howard Hawks screwball comedy Twentieth Century premiered with John Barrymore and Carol Lombard. 

 

1935- Disney Silly Symphony Water Babies, directed by Wilfried Jackson.

 

 

1968 - Actor Richard Harris attempted a singing career, releasing the song "MacArthur Park".

 

1972 -On the Dick Cavett talk show rock star and peace activist John Lennon said his phone had been tapped by FBI. It turns out it was, but at the time we all thought he was just paranoid from too many drugs.

 

1981- The musical play CATS opened in London.

 

1981- Bob Marley died of brain cancer at age 36. Marley and his group the Wailers, made Jamaican Reggae mainstream in pop music. 

 

tom sito's animation almanac for may 10, 2025

Birthdays: Fred Astaire, Phil Silvers, Nancy Walker, French royal minister Turgot, Marshal Jean Lannes, Marshal Nicolas Davout, John Wilkes Booth (assassin of Lincoln) Mark David Chapman (assassin of John Lennon), David O. Selznick, Mother Maybelle Carter, Ariel Durant, Jim Abrahams, Nancy Walker, Donovan, Homer Simpson, Bono, Kenan Thompson is 47, Paige O’Hara the voice of Belle in Beauty & the Beast.

 

 

1893- The U.S. Agriculture Dept. declared the tomato was officially a vegetable and not a fruit.

 

1908- The First Mother's Day celebrated; it became a national holiday in 1914. The holiday was inspiration of a social activist named Anna Jarvis, who spent the rest of her life trying to keep it from being commercially exploited. She died broke and surrounded by store-made mother’s day cards sent from well-wishers.

 

1908- An article in the New York Times advised women to wash their hair every two weeks. The norm then was every three months! 

 

1928- General Electric started up WG4 Schenectady, the first T.V. Station.

 

1929- Yankee slugger Babe Ruth signed new contract that paid him more money than President Herbert Hoover. Babe replied, "Well, I had a better year than he had.”

 

1929- Walt Disney’s short Skeleton Dance premiered. Animated mostly by Mickey Mouse designer Ub Iwerks, it was a breakthrough in tightly done musical sync animation.

 

 

1962-Happy Birthday Hulk! The first Incredible Hulk comic book.

 

1963- On the advice of George Harrison and Little Richard, Decca Records signed a new teen band called the Rolling Stones to a recording contract.

 

1977- Joan Crawford died of cancer and a heart attack. Once the most beautiful woman in Hollywood, now a neglected old recluse. She was 74. Soon after her daughter Christine published the memoir Mommy Dearest, in which she alleged years of abuse and neglect. Her last words were when she saw her nurse and maid were praying, she said,” Damn it! Don’t you dare ask God to save me!”