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Dec. 23, 1960: Paul Coates dips into the mailbag and writes about Hugh Hefner’s plans for Playboy tours “designed to appeal to the sophisticated urban young Playboy reader." Talk about futurism: Reader A.M. Spencer warns of the dangers of debris discarded by space travelers! |
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Dec. 23, 1940: If Greta Garbo is idle much longer, she'll have all the obscurity even she could ask, Jimmie Fidler says. |
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Dec. 23, 1960: Take that, Sluggo, you gender-stereotyping clod! On the jump, a “legless World War II veteran” is charged with having 250 reels of stag films…. Jack Smith goes Christmas shopping and finds his fellow human beings a bit lacking in the holiday spirit … bridge expert Alfred Sheinwold says the four of clubs is a card of warning … and Pope John XXIII reads his Christmas message. The Times said: “The pontiff dedicated much of his message … to the subject of truth. He especially appealed to all engaged in mass communication — press, radio, television, movies — to dedicate themselves to it.” ALSO 7 Men, Woman, Arrested in Lewd Film Racket, Oct. 24, 1957 King of Obscene Films Kills Self in Chicago, Sept. 14, 1947 |
| This sketch of Marya Marco by Herbert Ryman has been listed on EBay.
Ryman (d. 1989) was an illustrator and artist for Disney (he is credited with the concept drawings for Disneyland) and MGM,where he worked on "The Good Earth," "The Robe" and "The Tale of Two Cities," according to The Times. Marco, of course, is the woman who was mistakenly identified as Elizabeth Short in a photo published in “Black Dahlia Avenger.” The vendor says this is part of a lot of Marya Marco material obtained at an auction. Bidding starts at $9.99. ALSO |
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Dec. 22, 1960: Matt Weinstock has more on job applicants who aren’t hired after taking elaborate tests. One fellow scored too well, according to the test results. DEAR ABBY: I am at home all day with three children to take care of. Nothing exciting ever happens. I do the same thing every day. When my husband comes home, I just don't have anything to talk about. He certainly doesn't want to hear that I ironed today, did the dishes or vacuumed. Lately he's been asking why I don't talk to him. Well, I just don't have anything to talk about. We've been married eight years and are both 25. |
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Dec. 22, 1960: Police are hunting a “werewolf” and Paul Coates has more on the notorious Brink family, in which William Brink talks about changing his name to avoid the stigma. ALSO Paul Coates on the Brink family |
 Starsky and Hutch
Look! They had a two-for-one sale on Volkswagen Beetles! |
| I’m a respectful researcher. So when someone writes to The Times and asks about the location of a sleazy hotel featured in the “Bounty Hunter” episode of “Starsky and Hutch,” I assume there’s a good reason. Why people at The Times know to pass a question like this to me is an issue that I’m just going to ignore.
Young persons: “Starsky and Hutch” was one of those popular cop shows of the 1970s that your parents probably watched. The program moved between Wednesday nights at 10 and Tuesday nights at 9 and starred David Soul (yes, that’s his name) as Det. Kenneth Hutchinson and Paul Michael Glaser as Det. David Starsky. Here are screen grabs from Hulu of the sequence in question. Notice that the top of City Hall is barely visible in the opening frames. The entire episode is on Hulu. The hotel sequence begins at the 36:26 time mark. |
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Dec. 21, 1960: Matt Weinstock says City Editor Hank Osborne is baffled by a congressman's inquiry about the Mirror's deadline. "There are five editions a day, each with a deadline," Weinstock says. DEAR ABBY: My girlfriend is very jealous. My wife doesn't give me any trouble but my girlfriend checks every move I make. She calls all over town tracing me and hangs around the hall when we have union meetings. I don't know how many people she has watching me. I would like to get rid of her but she sticks like flypaper. I am 37 and she is 24 and a hot-tempered, suspicious Latin-American, if that helps you. She has threatened to kill me if I look at any woman (outside my wife) and I think she would do it. Can I get any help from the law? |
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Dec. 21, 1960: The Mirror publishes the second part of a profile on Maj. Claude Robert Eatherly, a B-29 pilot whose life unraveled after the U.S. bombing of Hiroshima. Eatherly didn’t drop the bomb, he was reporting on the cloud cover that day. But he blamed himself for the destruction. And Paul Coates has an update on the Brink family, which was covered in the 1947project way back in 2005! ALSO |
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A curtain or some type of fabric can be seen in Grim Sleeper No. 119, which has been identified, according to the Daily Beast, as victim Janecia Peters. I thought it would be interesting to see if I could find a similar background in any of the other photos, but I couldn’t. The LAPD has removed this photo from its website and although it’s still in The Times’ photo gallery, I felt there was no point in reposting it in its entirety. ALSO Grim Sleeper, Interiors |
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I suppose you thought we would never finish with Thelma Todd! Yesterday’s mystery photo was taken in 1964 and shows Harold Lloyd with his famous “permanent” Christmas tree. His mystery dog was named Pepe. |
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I picked up these two photos in a Pasadena thrift store years ago, mostly out of curiosity at the relatively sparse Christmas decorations. About all that’s clearly visible in the top photo are the wreaths in the windows, although the tree in the second photo gives it away. If you look closely, you’ll notice a few lilies on the furniture. For years, I assumed these photos were local until I took them out of the frames to scan them. In fact, these pictures are stamped “Moser & Son Cin’ti, O.” on the back, but are otherwise unidentified. The Cincinnati Public Library has some city directories online but they are huge pdf files and the time required to download and examine them in hopes of locating the photo studio is prohibitive. Given the push-button electric light switches, the Persian carpets, the tiger skin rug and the knobby, uncomfortable-looking (but undoubtedly expensive) furniture, I’d make a ballpark guess that this photo dates from 1900 to 1910. And how about this tree? It’s difficult to imagine a spindly specimen like this one strapped to the roof of the family SUV to be carted home and draped with lights and ornaments until the branches sag. I suspect most of us wouldn’t given it a second look at the Christmas tree lot. An interesting contrast to the notions we hold of an elaborate Victorian Christmas. ALSO |
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Also: The Will Hays office is moving to "clean house," in anticipation of a concerted drive by the Legion of Decency after Jan. 1. |
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Dec. 20, 1910: The Times reports on the distribution of money that was donated by the people of Los Angeles for families of The Times bombing victims. Although some modern writers insist The Times was a hated institution in this era, the amount of money collected for the families indicates a fair degree of support and sympathy. For example, $2,992.96 [$68,056.36 USD 2009] was given to Leola Harvey-Elder, the widow of Assistant City Editor Churchill Harvey-Elder, who died of his injuries after leaping from the burning building. |
The current Natalie Portman film is not, perhaps, technically a remake of this movie. Instead of dueling ballerinas, the 1942 film features dueling pirates. Instead of the "Dying Swan" dance, there is a big battle at sea with cannons. And instead of Portman and Mila Kunis, the 1942 film stars Tyrone Power and Maureen O'Hara. But everything else is totally the same.
Actually, 1942's "Black Swan" is based on a novel by Rafael Sabatini (I haven't read it, but I loved "Scaramouche") and concerns the uneasy relationships between the English, the Spanish and the non-law-abiding pirates in the glory days of the Spanish Main. Power plays Jamie, a very enthusiastic pirate whose hero Captain Morgan (Laird Cregar) lures him into a respectable non-pirating life as governor of Jamaica. This sits none too well with the feisty Margaret (O'Hara), whose dad was the previous governor, but Jamie finds her an irresistible wench all the same. Sparks fly!
Meanwhile, Jamie and Morgan's former pirating colleague Leech (George Sanders) is continuing to ply his trade off Jamaica in violation of Morgan's wishes. Jamie must use all his old pirating skills to track down his rival and win Margaret's affections! But will the siren song of the high seas lure him back again?
This movie's got a fab cast. In addition to the top stars it's got a sinister Anthony Quinn in an eye patch as Leech's sidekick, and a very lively Thomas Mitchell (yup, Uncle Billy) in a headscarf as Jamie's best friend, Tommie Blue. All the wigs and pirate beards do make it hard to recognize some people — I would never have identified Sanders (whom we last saw thinking about a brick wall in "Village of the Damned").
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Dec. 19, 1960: Matt Weinstock has the story of a man who cut down a tree that was destroying his sidewalk – but had trouble finding the city-required Melaleuca styphelioides (bottlebrush) to replace it. Also on the jump: A photo of a few objects swallowed by a patient at a New York mental institution — 258 to be exact. DEAR ABBY: There are two men in my life. One I love very much and the other I like only as a friend. My problem is this — the one I like only as a friend is my husband. The one I love is my husband's brother. I know my feeling for my brother-in-law is a sin, but…. |
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| Although some images show a window blocked with tinfoil (Interiors, 2) a few photos show windows blocked with what appears to be a paper bag attached with blue masking tape.
ALSO Grim Sleeper, Interiors
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The backgrounds in some of the photos show what appears to be a window covered with tinfoil. No. 22, above, is a frame from a video that shows this detail. Some of the images are indistinct and I’m only including the ones in which I’m fairly certain that the background is the same or similar. It’s interesting to notice that several types of photo technology are involved in this “series,” including video and print or digital cameras. The tinfoil arrangement in Nos. 42 (video) and 103 (still) appears to be the same and shows a small gap between the foil and the top of the window frame. ALSO Grim Sleeper, Interiors
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Dec. 19, 1960: Paul Coates has the story of William Gossett, who was scraping along on skid row one week and a street corner Santa Claus the next. |
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Dec. 19, 1940: Hedy Lamarr never uses red nail polish, Jimmie Fidler says. |
ladailymirror.com 