With few exceptions there not many people that are as popular decades after their death as Marilyn Monroe.
The public which normally cannot remember yesterday’s headlines has not forgotten Marilyn. Over 200 books about Marilyn will attest to that. Her films are still enticing to old film buffs and new generations of movie fans. And her face is everywhere. Continue reading
Lou Costello (l) and Bud Abbott (r) raise money at a War Bond rally in Los Angeles. Photo: Los Angeles Daily News
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello were the number one box office stars in 1942, so who better to go out and rouse the public to buy War Bonds?
The United States entered World War II after Japan’s surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941. Abbott and Costello were too old to serve in the armed forces, but they would do their part to aid the war effort.
The comedians each donated their $10,000 weekly personal appearance salary to the Army and Navy relief fund. Traveling the country, Continue reading
Ralph Barton & his 4th wife Germaine Talleferre photo: Daily News
“New York has ceased to be a city in which people live. It is necessary if one has to have quiet and peace to work to live in the suburbs. Steamships have made Europe a suburb of New York. I like to eat well, drink well and read grown up books, and these are not to be had in America.”
“New York is a crazy city and America is a madhouse. That is why I came back. I feel I belong here. Americans are crazy and I find I am crazy too. Americans are too rich. We have too much money. I have too much money. That is why I’m crazy. An artist ought to be prohibited from earning as much money as I do. Yet if someone suggested cutting my earnings, I’d scream so that you could hear me for three blocks.” – Ralph Barton upon returning to New York in 1929 after being in Paris for two years.
Barton committed suicide, Continue reading
Philip Ippolito airplane being Inspected on George Washington Bridge December 26, 1965 Photo; AP Wirephoto
From SNCA reader Jason Smith comes word that Philip Ippolito who on December 26, 1965 at age 19, made an emergency landing on the George Washington Bridge, died on December 19, 2021, at age 75.
Ippolito died of a heart attack in his home in Suffolk County, NY. He lived with a long time girlfriend and had no children. Survivors include his older sister Rose and a younger sister, Janice. A brother Robbie died in 2019.
Ippolito and Brennan in hospital photo Jim Hughes for NY Daily News
In 1965 Ippolito was a flying novice, having logged only 85 hours of flight time. With his plane in distress, Ippolito made the risky decision to land on the bridge. Along with his passenger Joseph Brennan, the two suffered only minor injuries. Ippolito decided against touching down in the Hudson River because Brennan could not swim. The FAA later tried unsuccessfully to revoke Ippolito’s pilots license.
You can read the amazing full story which we covered in 2015 by clicking here. Continue reading
Here is the Singer Building Tower in 1913 with its office lights ablaze in a photograph taken by Underwood and Underwood. The adjacent smaller towers to the right belong to the City-Investing Building.
For less than a year between 1908 -1909, the Singer Building, designed by Ernest Flagg, was the tallest in the world. The Metropolitan Life Insurance Building completed in 1909 took the tallest title away.
This magnificent New York City skyscraper vanished less than 60 years after its completion. Continue reading
The Los Angeles Times, New York Daily News, Philadelphia Inquirer were among the dozens of newspapers reporting the sad news of the passing of Don Law aka “Fats.” The Associated Press photo shows a rather glum grown-up Don.
You remember “Fats” from Our Gang a.k.a. The Little Rascals, right? Even serious fans of Our Gang may not exactly be sure which one Fats was. Probably the big fat kid.
Search your memory. You’ll come to the conclusion that you don’t remember anyone named ‘Fats’ in Our Gang. Continue reading
The New York Daily News used to do a feature, where they showed an old photograph of New York and had a modern photograph of the same scene.
From the newly completed Flatiron Building, here is Madison Square from about 1903.
Madison Square Garden and its tower are in the center of the photo. Brownstones and mostly low-rise buildings surround the Madison Square neighborhood. There are so few tall buildings that you can see the East River off in the distance. The building with the columns at the bottom of the photo is the Appellate Division courthouse. A small corner of Madison Square Park can be seen in the lower left,
Fast forward about 55 years and the changes are dramatic.
Daily News photographer David McLane had access from a similar vantage point in the Flatiron Building to take this photograph circa 1958. Continue reading
The approaching end of the regular baseball season got me thinking, what is the best baseball movie ever made? The clear winner for me would be the The Bad News Bears, hands down.
Some might disagree and say Field of Dreams, The Natural, A League of Their Own or Pride of The Yankees are better films. While those are all excellent movies, the 1976 Bad News Bears has an honesty and appeal that has endured for over 40 years. It’s also not just about baseball, it is about real life and overcoming challenges and disappointments. By the way, you can forget the lame remake in 2006 that failed at every level.
Yes, it’s been 40 years since the release of The Bad News Bears. That just blows my mind. I was a kid in 1976 and could very strongly relate to the action on the screen with things happening in my little league and off the field experiences.
Viewing the film now, I believe this exact version, line for line and scene for scene, could not and would not be made today. The world has become too politically correct and “sensitive.” The kids use the “n” word liberally. Pre-teens drink alcohol. 12 kids ride with beer-drinking Walter Matthau (while he’s behind the wheel) in an overloaded convertible, all of them not wearing seat belts. The fact that the film mirrored the way kids behaved and talked like in real life would probably upset too many people nowadays. Continue reading
The caption for this International News Photo reads:
Three Cops and A Woman In Life and Death Drama
New York – Four of the five principal characters in today’s (March 19) life or death drama staged in a Brooklyn residential district. Mrs. Edna Egbert, 50, is shown on the 2nd story ledge of her apartment while three policemen flank her trying to talk her out of her threat to jump in a suicide attempt. Failing to dissuade the woman, the policemen pushed her from the ledge– into a large emergency net that had been rigged below. The fifth hero in this drama is the first policeman on the scene, who kept Mrs. Egbert on her ledge for 25 minutes while the net was being rigged. (credit: International News Photo 3-19-42)
What the slug does not mention is what caused Mrs. Edna M. Egbert such distress.
In the past year Mrs. Egbert’s son Fred had gotten married, joined the army and had not written to her once in that time.
Apparently Fred was starting his own life, sans mother.
Logically Mrs. Egbert came to the conclusion that Fred must be dead.
Mrs Egbert climbed onto a window ledge at her home at 497 Dean St., Brooklyn and screamed: “I’m going to jump.” Continue reading
Westchester Home For Sale in 2014. In the 1930’s the home was known as Wisteria House. photo: HGMLS
You may or may not believe that houses have vibes, memories or energies surrounding them. But regardless of your beliefs, would you want to live on a property where a serial killer committed a murder so horrific that the police did not initially believe the details of the confession?
In a bucolic town in Westchester, NY, you can buy the three acre property where serial killer Albert Fish took and brutally killed ten-year-old Grace Budd on June 3, 1928.
Asking price – $799,900.
The home shown in the contemporary photograph above and in the vintage news photograph on the left was once known as Wisteria House, an 1860 villa in what was once Greenburgh, NY, and is now part of the town of Irvington.
Obviously the real estate agent listing the home will not advertise the fact, that on this property right behind the old home was where Wisteria Cottage stood (shown in photo to the right). This is where Albert Fish strangled, dismembered and later, at his own home, ate Grace Budd.
To say Albert Fish was one of the most heinous people who ever walked the earth would be an understatement.
Reading Fish’s life story is to uncover the debaucheries of a real life Hannibal Lecter as described in Silence of the Lambs. Continue reading