Hollywood press hoopla at work here.
This is the improbable news slug originally accompanying this publicity photograph: Continue reading
Go into the supermarket and examine just about any product. You will notice shrinking packaging and products. You are getting less and paying more.
Tropicana orange juice just shrunk again – from 64 ounces to 59 ounces to 52 ounces and now 46 ounces. Coffee is sold in a pound can, but contains about 11.3 ounces of product.
In 1954 the price of coffee was rising, and the answer was not shrink the cup, but raise the price. A 50% price hike to be exact, from ten cents to fifteen cents.
Even after World War II many places still sold a nickel cup of coffee.
The original news slug reads: Continue reading
Willie Mays died June 18, 2024 at the age of 93. The accolades and remembrances will pour in over the next few days. We’ll let two photos and a video serve as a microcosm of a brilliant career that writers will try to summarize but will undoubtedly fall short.
Mays was that good.
If Willie Mays was not the all around best baseball player of all-time he certainly ranks as one of the top five.
The above view of Mays’ 1954 World Series catch was taken by United Press photographer Sid Birns.
The original news slug says: Continue reading
Yankees second baseman Alfred Manuel “Billy” Martin had a tough childhood growing up in Berkeley, California. A small boy with a large nose, Billy was picked on by the other kids. Billy learned to fight back and hit hard and never back down. But it would cost Martin. He was thrown off his high school basketball and baseball teams for fighting.
Martin’s toughness carried over to the major leagues, fighting players such as Cubs pitcher Jim Brewer, Red Sox outfielder Jimmy Piersall and others who he felt had provoked him. Martin’s most famous fights were with Clint Courtney, a fiery scrapper and the first major league catcher to wear eyeglasses.
This photo above shows their first confrontation, as the news slug describes:
Cut-Up On The Diamond
New York: After a heated exchange of punches, Clint Courtney (right) and Billy Martin of the Yanks continue their brawl in close-quarter action as Joe Collins (41) rushes to break up the fracas. The Brownie catcher, claiming he had been tagged hard on the head, charged at Martin after being thrown out at second base on an attempted steal in the 8th inning of the July 12th game at the stadium. Courtney was ejected from the game after the fight was broken up, but Martin was allowed to remain. Yanks scored a 5-4 victory. photo: Arthur Rickerby United Press International 7-12-1952
Though it’s not mentioned in the news slug, Yankees starting pitcher Allie Reynolds knocked Continue reading
INSIDE HOLLYWOOD by Nat Dallinger (week ending July 13 1951)
Audrey Totter is an attentive listener as Ricardo Montalban related a story during a dinner at Romanoff’s, in Beverly Hills. A radio actress before embarking on a screen career, Audrey once worked as a door-to-door saleslady for a wax concern. After a highly successful career in radio, she received offers from the New York stage and Hollywood. Selecting the latter, this blue-eyed blonde has won top starring roles for herself in numerous motion pictures. Romantically she is expected to become the bride of film producer Armand Deutsch. photo: Nat Dallinger for King Features Syndicate
Nat Dallinger would capture Hollywood celebrities in candid moments for his syndicated photo column Inside Hollywood.
Audrey Totter (1917-2013) never became a Hollywood star of the first magnitude but appeared steadily in films throughout the 1940s and early 50s. Continue reading
Pitching For Pictures
Hollywood, Calif. – Bob Lemon, (left) star hurler of the Cleveland Indians, goes through some mound paces with actor Ronald Reagan, who’ll play the famed Grover Cleveland Alexander in a film now in production. Lemon, who also has a part in the film, was hired to give Reagan a few tips on pitching style. credit: United Press (1/28/52)
The subject has the makings of a fine dramatic movie. The Winning Team (1952) starring future President Ronald Reagan along with Doris Day is Continue reading
In the pantheon of anti-drug films The Terrible Truth (1951), a ten minute short, holds a special place in my heart.
Not because of its low production values. Not because its message is totally alarmist. But akin to many stag films of the same period, Continue reading
Audrey Hepburn, Gregory Peck in Roman Holiday (1953)
When shooting a film there’s only one chance to get a genuine reaction for a scene that is not in the script.
In director Willy Wyler’s 1953 film Roman Holiday there is an improvised scene that star Audrey Hepburn was not told about.
Who came up with the idea to improvise is open to debate; director Wyler or co-star Gregory Peck.
In Jan Herman’s excellent biography A Talent for Trouble: The Life of Hollywood’s Most Acclaimed Director, William Wyler (Putnam) 1995, two versions are given for the genesis of the famous scene: Continue reading
Previously we featured this photograph of Bettie Page a number of years ago. But we never gave the backstory, so here it is.
The photograph was taken in Africa, USA by future Playboy magazine photographer (and later a pin-up girl herself) Linnea “Bunny” Yeager.
Bunny Yeager self-portrait 1960 photo: Bunny Yeager
Bettie Page and Bunny Yeager 1954 at Africa, USA photo via Gnarlymag.com
My mother and father tell of practicing “duck and cover” in school.
The drill was to supposedly protect oneself from a nuclear bomb. As if crouching under a desk would have done anything to shield you from an atomic blast. Continue reading
