Ten-year old Jay R. Smith made his debut as part of the “Our Gang” comedy group in Boys Will Be Joys in 1925. He was brought on by Hal Roach as a replacement for the popular Mickey Daniels. Freckle-faced Jay stuck with Roach Studios for five years, appearing in over thirty short films, until he …
This week’s Ilustration Friday‘s challenge word is “stripes”. John Philip Sousa composed 136 marches in his lifetime. Sousa, the leader of the United States Marine Band, composed one of his most famous on Christmas Day 1896, as a tribute to his friend David Blakely, the manager of the Sousa Band, who had recently passed away. The …
Who knows what Suzan Ball’s career could have been? At 13, young Suzan Ball moved from Jamestown, New York to Hollywood to a home near Universal-International Pictures (a division of Universal formed from a merger to distribute lower budget films and British imports). Suzan, second cousin to comedienne Lucille Ball, landed her first acting job at …
Viv Stanshall hated being referred to as “eccentric”. He felt it suggested that he was putting on an act. He wasn’t. When he and band-mate Neil Innes first met, Viv was wearing checked pants, a Victorian frock coat, purple glasses, pink rubber ears and was carrying a euphonium. The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band (originally “Dada” Band, …
Just after separating from her second husband, twenty-one year old Barbara Payton took her young son and set off for Hollywood to take a shot at stardom. At a Hollywood nightclub, Barbara, a fun-loving “party girl” caught the attention of a Universal Studios executive. She was given the female lead opposite Lloyd Bridges in the …
Everyone knows professional wrestling is fake. The fans know. The wrestlers know. The officials know. Everyone. But, professional wresting has remained popular ever since it was the only thing to watch in the early days of television. In fact, it has exponentially increased in popularity and made a fortune for its promoters, most notably Vince …
You need a bear? Call Janos. You need a gorilla? Call Janos. You need a monster? Call Janos. For fifteen years, Janos Prohaska was Hollywood’s “go-to” guy when a script called for a ursine, simian or otherworldly character to interact with a leading actor. Janos would don one of his many homemade costumes and happily …
This weeks Illustration Friday challenge word is contraption. This is the second of two illustrations for the topic. Here is the first. Elijah McCoy worked as a fireman and oiler on the Michigan Central Railroad in the late 1800s. He often tinkered in his home workshop trying to devise new methods for lubricating machinery. He …
This week’s Illustration Friday challenge word is “contraption”. This is the first of two illustrations for the topic. Here is the second. In 1970, 25-year old Steve Wozniak was working at a California company on their mainframe computer. He met a summer employee, 20-year old Steve Jobs and the two became friends. Jobs got an …
Diana (pronounced “DEE-ana”) Dors was under contract to The Rank Organization, a large British entertainment conglomerate, and appeared in many of their films beginning in the mid-1940s. Her portrayals of femme fatales and objects of unrequited love, coupled with her striking, yet familiar, good looks led to her comparison to a certain American sex symbol. By …
