Animation Fun Facts for March 2, 2017

Birthdays: Sam Houston, Alexander Graham Bell, Kurt Weill, Desi Arnaz ( Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III ), Ted Geisel aka Dr. Suess, Mikhail Gorbachov, Willis O'Brian, Moe Berg, Karen Carpenter, Lou Reed, Jennifer Jones, John Cullum is 87, John Irving, Tom Wolfe, Jon Bon Jovi is 55, Daniel Craig is 49, animator Stephen Chiodo

1922- A 21 year old veteran named Walt Disney after getting out of the army began studying in the public library Edwin Lutz's book "Motion Picture Animation and How it is Made". In Kansas City he and his brother Roy persuaded the owner of a small chain of vaudeville theaters to fund some cartoons. Today the Newman's Laff-O-Grams Company was formed. A year later the Disney brothers would move to Hollywood and start a new enterprise called the Walt Disney Company

1947- Crusading Hollywood union organizer Herb Sorrell was plucked off the street in Glendale by gangsters posing as police. They may not have been just posing, many movie studios at the time hired off-duty LAPD at double time rates to rough up troublesome employees. They drive Herb up to Mulholland and work him over, leaving him by the side of the road. Shortly after leaving the hospital, Sorrell was jailed for disturbing public peace.

1961- Pablo Picasso married his second wife Jacqueline. He was 80, she was 35. Jacqueline cared for the increasingly reclusive artist and kept even his family at a distance. When Picasso died in 1973 she turned away many family members from the funeral. Jacqueline committed suicide in 1986.

1965-  The movie The Sound of Music opened at the Rivoli theater in Manhattan.

1971- Charles Engelhard died, a venture capitalist whose wild investments and grand lifestyle made him the inspiration for Ian Fleming’s villain Auric Goldfinger.

1973- The Women in Film organization founded.

1976- Francis Ford Coppola began shooting his epic film“ Apocalypse Now” in the Philippines. The film was plagued by cost overruns, a typhoon and his Philippine Army helicopters frequently flying off to fight real guerrillas in the middle of shooting, but somehow it all got done. Today it is considered a classic.

1982- Science Fiction writer Philip K. Dick died of a stroke in Santa Ana California. The author of stories the movies Blade Runner, Minority Report and Total Recall were based. Dick said he was at times possessed by a superalien who appeared in his mind in a beam of pink light. His autobiography was titled “ I am alive and you are dead.”