tom sito's animation almanac for feb 20,2025

History for 2/20/2025

Birthdays: Honore' Daumier, Nancy Wilson, Ansel Adams, Cindy Crawford, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Robert Altman, Roger Penske. Phil Esposito, Jennifer O’Neill, Ivanna Trump, Mike Leigh, Lili Taylor, Sidney Poitier, Rihanna (Robin Rihanna Fenty) is 39

 

1816- "Fee-Garr-Row! Fig-Ar- Roww- Figaro-Figaro, Figaro, Figaro"- Giacomo Rossini's opera 'The Barber of Seville' premiered. Rossini endured bad press and heavy criticism at the time because another opera of the Marriage of Figaro had just been premiered by Paisiello, an inferior composer who then was enjoying more popularity than him.

 

1824- The first attempt to name and classify a dinosaur. At the Geological Society of London, Dean William Buckland announced the Megalosaurus or the Great Fossil Lizard of Stonesfield. Based on a leg bone he estimated it at 40 feet long and a bulk larger than an elephant. 

 

 

1925- Willis O’Brien’s silent movie The Lost World premiered. Based on Conan-Doyles 1912 novel. The stop motion animation of dinosaurs and exploding volcanoes issued in a new era of special effects films. O'Brien later did King Kong. 

 

 

1936- The film “Follow the Fleet” premiered, with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.

 

1937- The Raymond Scott Orchestra recorded his composition “Powerhouse.” Used in many Looney Tunes cartoons.

 

1937 Mickey Mouse short “ Moose Hunters”.

 

1947- In a lecture to the London Mathematical Society, Computer pioneer Alan Turing said the best way to test the intelligence of a computer would be to teach it to play chess. Earliest reference to interactive gaming.

 

1958- Hercules premiered, starring body-builder Steve Reeves and Sylvia Koscina. It spawned a genre of muscle-man movies set in ancient Greece and Rome. Called in Hollywood jargon, “ sword & sandal flicks”.

 

 1962- "God Go with You, John Glenn!" Mercury -7 sent the first American into orbit.

 His first words upon emerging from the space capsule were:” It was hot in there.” Glenn later became a Democratic senator and in his 70’s went into space a second time on a space shuttle in 1998. 

 

1980- Bon Scott, vocalist for the band AC/DC, was found dead in a friend’s automobile choked in his own vomit.

 

1986- The Soviets launch the first permanent orbiting space station, Mir, which means Peace. After a long career in which 7 US astronauts among many others spent time there in 2001 it finally burned up in re-entry. The International Space Station went up shortly after.

 

 

2005-20^th Anniv- First episode of Seth Green’s Robot Chicken premiered on TV.

 

2006- The animated film Wallace & Gromet: Curse of the Were-Rabbit, won the British Academy Award (BAFTA) for the best British Film of the year. It beat out The Constant Gardner, and Pride & Prejudice.