Diana Day Humphries, 16, breaks into tears as she meets her mother at a Houston jail.
Note: This is an encore post from 2008.
Teenager is in custody on charges of shooting her brother to death. She tells police she was unable to carry out plot to murder her parents. Continue reading
September 25, 1944
Walter Winchell says: Capt. J. Patterson (or his double), according to startled staffers, made visits to the Times publisher several times last week. What’s cookin? … Morton Downey and Molly Vanderbilt are the town’s most serious romance … Luise Rainer’s newest interest in life is V. Bendix, the industrialist… Allen Dulles,* brother of Dewey’s chief adviser, is back from Switzerland, where he was “stranded” for two years. He will talk off-the-record at the Council on Foreign relations … Several war correspondents are less optimistic than they were three weeks ago about the war ending this year.
Louella Parsons says: All the battles Sam Goldwyn had with Warner Bros. over obtaining the rights to “Those Endearing Charms” will come to naught. At the time he purchased the play it was taken to the Dramatists Guild for a settlement on the claim Sam had bought it before Warners did. Now he isn’t going to make it after all. He’s sold it, I understand, through his agent to RKO. Charles Koerner will star Laraine Day, whose contract he shares with MGM.
Danton Walker says: Mrs. Woodrow Wilson, far from being flattered by Geraldine Fitzgerald’s glamorous impersonation of herself in “Wilson,” has indicated her disapproval to Darryl Zanuck in no uncertain terms… Louis B. Mayer’s renewed interest in religious matters dates, they say, from his serious conversations with Archbishop Spellman in New York last spring.
LIBRA: Inactive star indications now. Let added vigor influence work and projects no little. Mark time where you should. Keep tuned to step into action on favorable wave.
*Allen Dulles was, of course, serving in the OSS and was later head of the CIA.
From the Philadelphia Inquirer via Fultonhistory.com.
Continue reading
September 25, 1944
Claire Poe of Miami Beach, Fla., appears on the cover of Life’s special issue “A Letter to GIs,” because she is the kind of good-looking American girl that a lot of GIs know and would like to hear from. She is 18, a natural blonde, and has just entered Florida State College for Women as a freshman. She has been corresponding with a sergeant in Puerto Rico and an ensign at Fort Lauderdale, but has no steady boyfriends. She wants to become an arithmetic teacher.
Life assigns Andreas Feininger and Margaret Bourke-White to take photographs for its special issue “A Look at America.” Bourke-White took photographs from a TWA plane while Feininger remained on the ground.
The issue was intended for Americans serving overseas who could foresee the end of the war and were wondering what America would be like when they returned. Life said: “You know the war will not be over until the last shots are fired in Germany and Japan. But your victories have brought the end in sight. You want to finish the job and come home.”
Before deregulation and the breakup of the phone company, there was only Bell Telephone. And it was very popular with the Greatest Generation, particularly between 7 p.m. and 10 p.m.
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
September 25, 1907
Los Angeles
Meet Joe Gans, a boxer whose name once echoed among fans of the ring now buried in the dusts of sporting history. Gans may well have been one of the finest fighters whoever lived—among sportswriters, he inspired long and lofty stories about his artistry in dispensing with an undistinguished opponent. But Gans puzzled the men who tried to capture him in words; not a braggart, nor a thug. He was thoughtful and at heart, mournful, they said.
Gans was training at Lucky Baldwin’s ranch in Arcadia for a match with Jimmy Burns at the Pavilion—20 rounds.
Sept. 24, 1957
As dedicated ocean fishermen know, this is one of the greatest seasons in years for pulling in the elusive beauties of the deep.
For many years they’ve had to be satisfied with getting “skunked” completely or with a few frustrating strikes or with hooking a few confused mackerel, tired bass, surprised flounder, goggle-eyed perch or bored tomcod.
Red Rowe, an ardent ocean fisherman, best expressed the situation the other day in describing a foray about a mile off Oceanside. Suddenly, all around the boat the water was rippling with a variety of eager, hungry fish.
“I remember during the lean years when we used to catch a few mackerel,” he said. “I’d yearn for the hard, solid yank of a barracuda. Well, there I was, trying to get my bait through the barracuda without them grabbing it so I could get down to the yellowtail. Continue reading
September 24, 1959: Orange County authorities reopen their investigation into the death of Myford Plum Irvine, who was found shot to death Jan. 11, 1959, in the basement of his Tustin mansion. Irvine was shot twice in the stomach with a 16-gauge shotgun and once in the head with a .22 and police say it might not be suicide after all.
Paul Coates on a victim of the old magazine subscription scam.
Note: This is an encore post from 2005 and originally appeared on the 1947project.
And how do the young men of Los Angeles indicate their interest in a young woman? Do they court her with roses or candy or mash notes? In fact, ardent suitors have found that there’s no better way to a woman’s heart than with the hood ornament from a 1946 or 1947 Buick.
It seems the chrome-plated circles make perfect bracelets and victimized Buick owners are writing furious letters to The Times.
“I casually began counting Buicks and noting how many did not have the rings in a two-mile drive along Beverly and down Fairfax and found that 13 out of 17 Buicks have lost their rings from the hood ornament,” wrote Bill Gilholm of Hermosa Beach. “Is it a gang doing this for profit or are they just kids trying to be funny?”
September 24, 1944
Louella Parsons says: Why is young Van Johnson the idol of the bobby sox brigade and at this moment crowding Frank Sinatra and Alan Ladd for top honors? Van isn’t handsome, he hasn’t a striking physique and he hasn’t Frankie’s ability to sing. Moreover, there are many other young men who are as capable of putting over emotional scenes. Yet Van is the hero of the bobby sox brigade and is receiving more mail than any actor or actress on the MGM lot.
Leading the bestseller list — Fiction: “Green Dolphin Street,” “Leave Her to Heaven,” “History of Rome Hanks,” “Pastoral” and “Strange Fruit”
Non-fiction: “I Never Left Home,” “The Time for Decision,” “Yankee From Olympus,” “Anna and the King of Siam” and “Basic History of the United States.”
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
September 24, 1907
Los Angeles
A First Day in Los Angeles
Roving, roving, ever restless, drifting
On from strand to strand.
Have I seen the years slip by me,
Seeking for the promised land.
From the palm trees of Jamaica and
The Golden Spanish main.
To the gray and sullen northland when
The snow was on the plain.
But today I cease from roaming and
My soul is well content—
For the gypsy came among you and
He pitches his world-worn tent.
But the old desire was silenced for he
Found his long-sought rest.
In the City of Angels, in the
Sunset of the West.
Walter Adolf Roberts
557 Crocker St., Los Angeles.
September 23, 1959: To folks who think traffic in Los Angeles is a new problem, please read the stories on 1) freeways 2) new buses 3) moving sidewalks. Bonus story 4) drunk drivers.
Matt Weinstock on the complaint that teachers spend too much time maintaining order in the classroom and too little time teaching. “And yet I happen to know that on the third day of school a knife with a 3-inch blade was taken from an arrogant 9-year-old by a child welfare and attendance officer, who says grimly: “It looks like another tough year.”
September 23, 1959: In Iowa, a host tells Nikita Khrushchev: “We have a saying — the Lord helps those who help themselves.”
Khrushchev replies: “God is helping us too, because we are developing quicker, and God therefore is on our side. He helps the intelligent.” One thing that struck me in reading the old stories about Khrushchev’s visit is how often he made biblical references. There’s no question that religion was against communist teachings and Soviet policy, and yet his conversation is dotted with Christian references.
The Air Force cancels the F-108 and North American Aviation announces plans to lay off 2,000 employees, divided evenly between plants in Los Angeles and Columbus, Ohio.
Paul Coates on how not to start a conversation … and Abby’s advice to a widow who wants to meet a good man and get married.
Note: This is an encore post from 2005 and originally appeared on the 1947project.
Janet Flanner, during her many years in Paris as European correspondent for the New Yorker magazine, picked up the French love of epigrams. Genet, as she is known to the magazine readers, tried this out yesterday on a Town Hall audience at the Biltmore.
“The United States was the richest country in the world—that’s dandy. Now it is the only rich country in the world, which is terrible.”
September 23, 1944
Dear Martha Foster: I’m not such an old-fashioned biddy as to believe that the standards of our Puritan forebears can be held up as a way of life in this hardboiled age, but it frightens me sometimes to see the cynical disregard for morals and discipline that marks the attitude of our young people today.
Dear Martha: Surely you can’t be talking about what we now call the Greatest Generation. Sincerely, Mr. Baby Boomer.
Louella Parsons says: I don’t wonder William Goetz is eager to get Loretta Young started before the cameras. She looks so wonderful since the birth of her baby, and so radiant. He has decided to co-star her with Gary Cooper in Gary’s first independent production, a western, tentatively titled “The American Cowboy.” It’s laid in 1885 and will give Loretta a chance to wear the costumes of that period.
VIRGO: Improved conditions exist. Check carefully before you move to avoid errors, then proceed with assurance. Think and act logically.
Note: This is an encore post from 2006.
September 23, 1907
Los Angeles
A crowd of 2,000—the faithful and the doubters—gathered at Echo Park Lake as black evangelist the Rev. J.L. Griffin prepared to baptize five believers in the cold water. Children climbed in the trees to get a better view, while other people watched from rowboats.
The rite was supposed to begin at 4 p.m., but several of the people were delayed and Griffin, who had been holding tent revival meetings in Los Angeles all summer, addressed the increasingly impatient throng.
September 22, 1959: How the city library saves money in tough times.
“Sometimes I think many people only think they think for themselves,” Matt Weinstock says. Continue reading
September 22, 1959: Mayor Poulson deliberately “shoved the knife” into Soviet Premier Khrushchev, two television newscasters charged today.
Paul Coates takes a survey on what people think about the visit of Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev.
Note: This is an encore post from 2005 and originally appeared on the 1947project.
And then he was gone as if he had never been here at all. The hundreds of people who threw themselves at his feet to kiss the hem of his robes or simply to occupy the chair where he had been sitting were nothing but a memory.
He was Avak Hagopian, a somber 20-year-old from Kharadag in Azerbaijan, and working in Tehran as a mechanic—or a goldsmith—the stories vary. He paused one day as he was about to bring down a mallet and was struck with a vision, a vision that returned twice more. With faith in God, he would cure the sick, the blind and the diseased. The young man with the dark, intense eyes grew a beard and let his hair flow to his shoulders. He became “Avak the Healer” or “Avak the Great,” performer of miracles.
Continue reading
Clara Bow in Kid Boots (1926).
The Los Angeles Silent Film Festival achieved remarkable success for its debut the weekend of September 12-14, drawing large, young, and enthusiastic crowds eager for silent films. Organized as “a celebration devoted to the artistry, innovation, and enduring power of silent cinema,” the festival screened a combination of well known classics and recently restored films, offering a little something to please everyone. Produced in conjunction with the American Cinematheque and Mount St. Mary’s Department of Film, Media and Communication, organizers Thomas Barnes, founder of Retroformat Silent Films, Kelby Thwaits, Director of Graduate Programs in Film, Television, and New Media at Mount St. Mary’s, and filmmaker Brooke Dammkoehler, the LASFF revealed the power of silent films to still emotionally speak to us today.
Over the weekend, the Festival recognized two archivists for their contributions to the field. Renowned author and respected film historian Anthony Slide received the LASFF Award for Film Scholarship to recognize how his “research and writing have rescued films, artists, and stories from obscurity.” For more than 50 years, his erudite research, audio commentaries, essays, and writing of such books as Lois Weber: The director Who Lost Her Way in History and The Silent Feminists have educated cinemagoers and deepened their understanding of the workings of the silent film industry and its founding pioneers..
This week’s mystery movie was the 1960 episode The Case of the Treacherous Toupee, which opened the fourth season of Perry Mason.
With Raymond Burr, Barbara Hale, William Hopper, William Talman, Ray Collins, Peggy Converse, Philip Ober, Bert Freed, Cindy Robbins, Thomas B. Henry, Robert Redford, Nelson Olmsted, Dee Arlen, Jonathon Hole, Frank Wilcox, Lindsay Workman, Juney Ellis, Rita Duncan, Hal Smith, Len Henry, George E. Stone, Lee Miller and Patricia Marlowe.
Perry Mason is available on DVD from Critics’ Choice Video and is streaming on the web. Continue reading
ladailymirror.com 