#The Front Page 1931

[world-of-advice]

[bleedingcoffee42]

Held off on this because it's becoming disheartening to see a lot of the BoB Tumblr research reposted or remastered with dubious credit, but at the end of the day I really want people to know about Norma Jean Darland Grant, Chuck Grant's wife.

Norma, I don't even know where to start with you. As I dive into the records to find people and make their stories known, nobody has had so much tragedy and absolutely bizarre circumstances revolving around their lives as you. I've never wanted to reach back in time and give someone a hug so badly as I do with this lady. I hope Chuck was your sunshine, I hope you found happiness, I wish you were not the victim of circumstances beyond your control.

Norma was born in Mahaska. Co, Iowa on February 11, 1923. Her father George was a farmer. Her mother Mable Moody Darland , was the daughter of a farmer. She had an older brother Donald. In 1925 they moved to Newton, Iowa, then ended up in Detroit.

Full stop, because George Darland...holy shit did this guy get into everything. And I do mean unbelievable non-stop news. In 1920 George was tearing down a cow barn with his father in law, barn collapses, father in law gets scalped. They have to take William Moody to town on a stretcher, George has a broken shoulder and helps carry him, Moody ends up with 21 stitches and no broken bones. In 1921 George , recently recovered from pneumonia, pulls some Oregon Trail shit and tries to get to his corn farming island in the river when the ferry rope broke, wagon fell off the barge, his team drowns and he almost drowns under one of them. Even the paper is like "damn, this is the unluckiest guy in Iowa." Oh...it's only 1921. Just wait.

He also got into a fight with some guy in town and got busted up earlier that summer, something about a cheese knife and billiard cue and- no- the article does not explain that. Oh, and don't forget the spreading viper he decided to catch in September. Throw in a modest sprained ankle in 1922. There are a few years without news, and I am sure it's just because it's not available to us a 100 years later, yet.

Mable Moody Darland dies in Detroit in 1929, of diffuse peritonitis, after what appears to have been a two year stint in the city to work at Braggs Mfg. After Mable dies, George goes home and the kids are at his parents in Barnes City while he heads to Des Moines to work for his brother. In 1930 Norma Jean writes to Santa and breaks my heart.

However, earlier that year in 1930 George gets involved in the B.O. Darland Grocery Store bullshit and gets shot. Here's the story.: There is a cop, William J. Aiken, who lives a few houses down from George's brother Bert and his family. George's brother Bert has a grocery store on the corner. George is working for him even though the census says he's a mechanic. Mrs. Aiken might be getting more than groceries from Darland's Grocery store. Husband goes to drag her out of the store, punches Bert, draws a gun, gun goes off and George is shot in the leg, then Aiken kicks the shit out of his wife all while Aiken's partner sits in the car and doesn't watch. Trial ensues, Aiken says he used the gun as a club to defend himself and doesn't know who's finger pulled the trigger. Front page Des Moines news, complete with maps! The Judge dismissed the case against Aiken, but Aiken loses his job as detective, and is also later arrested for bootlegging. Wild Norma has not one, but two, men in her life who get shot for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. This poor girl.

It seems George rebounded and found a new Mabel to marry, Mabel Kerr in 1931. Mabel #2's husband Jack, a coal miner who had been working the mines since he was orphaned at 9, was arrested for bootlegging. That left her and their 6 children out of luck as Jack was sentenced to 3 months in jail and a fine of $300. Well, along came the unluckiest guy in Iowa and they were married at her sister's house in Raritan, Illinois in 1931. (If you think Raritan sounds familiar it's because Raritan, NJ was home of Basilone. The Raritan River was where the Nixon Nitration Works was located on. People from this area in NJ left in the 1850s to go start a town with NJ names in Illinois just to fuck with me.)

In 1932 in Tracey, Iowa the schoolhouse George and family are living in, burns down. How much family? Unclear.

1933 rolls around. In Des Moines, Darland's Grocery-- Bert specifically--gets robbed at gunpoint March 16, for $15, milk, sugar, butter and eggs. The same day Jack Kerr visits his family in Albia. George dies March 30, 1933 in Oskaloosa?(maybe?) and I have no idea how. Mabel #2 moves on an remarries in 1938, and her Kerr kids go with her and the Darland kids eventually go west with the Darland family to LA. Norma lives with her aunt Mrytle Darland Morrow and goes to school in Santa Monica. Bert Darland moves west too, restarts the grocery business out there and sells it a few times. He avoids being shot, but a poodle did bite him at one point and couldn't be found so Bert probably got a lot of painful Rabies shots.

George is buried in Bellefontaine Cemetery where Mable #1 is, along with loads of Mable #2 family. There is a death notice in the paper, no obit. 'What Killed George Darland' haunts me because this man survived so much and there is no news about what finally got him.

Back to Norma . She goes to Santa Monica High School. Joins the World Friendship Club and Riding Club. In 1938 is at a party celebrating the engagement of her cousin Thelma. She joins the marines in 1943 and by war's end is a corporal. She is stationed at Miramar in San Diego, muster roll says she is with the aviation women's reserve squadron. In 1945 is maid of honor for a fellow marine friend. On her marriage certificate in Nov 1946 she lists her residence as Santa Monica.

How does she meet Chuck Grant who at this point has been out of the hospital a year and is dealing with paralysis and speech issues? Another burning question. However in November 1946 they go to Vegas with Chuck's friend Keith Morgan and his wife and get married. They move to San Diego where she becomes a cashier at the Naval Training Station. 40 hours a week as a payroll clerk. Chuck is used as an example of Navy efforts to assist wounded veterans in a newspaper article, possibly because Norma is working there. They have their first son Dan in 1947 and Charles Jr in 1951.

Then in September 8, 1954, Norma ODs. 7am Chuck goes to the bedroom and finds her, takes the kids to a friends house in Clairemont, and returns to call the cops at 9:15 am and answer questions. He told the detective he wanted to spare the kids the details of their mother's death and didn't want them present from the inquiry. It is ultimately ruled a suicide by the coroner, overdose by barbiturates.

Norma Jean Darland Grant was cremated and is buried in Rosecrans military cemetery in San Diego under her maiden name. I don't know if Chuck just signed off on paperwork and didn't correct it or what. The burial form stipulates there are interment rights in her grave but he ends up buried in Forest Lawn in LA instead.

Norma was 31 years old. From what we can tell, Chuck never remarried.

Thank you to @noneedtoamputate for caring about Chuck and his family and going on this journey of research into the Darlands. For every fact we unearth, we still gain no insight into Chuck's personality. But we've earned those Oregon Trail T-Shirts for learning about George. Thank you for listening to my screaming in the inbox because every. damned. person in Chuck Grant's orbit has some truly messed up shit in their lives. This post is a summary of months of research that has been interesting for sure.

[cursedreverie1945]

This format is going to be a little different because it’s not just simple facts. I have a lot to say about this bag of hate. Also, this is over 7 pages on Microsoft Word. Buckle up. It's a long one.

@atticuscat

Hans Friedrich Karl Franz Kammler

He was better known as simply Hans Kammler.

He is probably one of the least known but most impactful of the more infamous bags of shite.

His young life was non-descript. There was nothing about really written about his early years that screamed out that he would be one of the worst men or the best at the worst. Depending on how you look at it, of course.

What made him stand out was his dedication to nazism. He joined the NSDAP in either 1931 or 1932, as various news agencies and websites report different dates. He was a rigid ideologue, and held various administrative positions, including being the head of the construction department at the Imperial Ministry of Aviation. In 1933, Kammler joined the SS.

He was responsible for the five-year program to organize concentration camps in the occupied territories of the USSR and Norway. Kammler was also involved in the design of the Auschwitz death camp and others. The sheer attention to detail made him all the more dangerous. The death camps were planned by this man, right down to the methods of cremation.

Kammler believed “subjugation” would require the murder of 20-30 million people from the Eastern Front, plus from the murder of what he considered undesirables.

It is known that Kammler organized the SS Special Staff in the section of the "Skoda" company located in the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. This would have been under the control of Reinhard Heydrich at the time. I have no idea how much Heydrich would have known about this, but knowing that bastard, I imagine it would have been most everything.

In March 1942, Himmler officially transferred the management of the "Skoda" plant to the SS, a giant industrial complex located in Pilsen and Brno. Speer knew nothing about this operation until he was informed about it as an accomplished fact.

In 1943 Kammler was appointed the Reichsführer SS special representative for the "A-4" program, otherwise known as vengeance weapons. He was put in charge of construction work and labor supply from concentration camps. The camps that worked their human slaves to death, on a quite literal level, were part of this man’s signature.

“The Holocaust would not have been as ‘efficient’ were it not for Kammler,” said Dean Reuter, author of “The Hidden Nazi: The Untold Story of America’s Deal with the Devil,” “He was integral to the evolution of mass murder.” We’ll get back to Reuter later.

In March 1944, Kammler became a representative of Himmler in the "aviation staff," which consisted of senior officials from the Luftwaffe and the Ministry of Armaments.

Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring, the head of the Luftwaffe and Hateler's nominal successor, tasked him with moving all strategic aviation facilities underground. From March 1944, Kammler supervised the construction of underground factories to produce fighter aircraft.

The bombing of Germany had become so prevalent that they wanted to move everything underground to possibly get ahead in the war machine. Obviously, as I sit in my American home, speaking English as my native language, and being quite liberal in my politics that involves having told a vast number of politicians in my lifetime that they were vile bootlickers, you can see how well that worked for Kammler, Himmler and Hateler. Also, what is up with Kammler and Himmler? They sound like names from some fascist cartoon.

After three months, Himmler reported to Hateler that ten underground aviation factories with a total area of tens of thousands of square meters had been built in eight weeks. EIGHT WEEKS. The sheer work that goes into something like that is virtually unheard of today.

 In August of 1945 the Allies sent a list of six underground factories that had been penetrated to the U.S. Air Force headquarters in Europe. Each of these factories continued to produce aviation engines and other specialized equipment for the Luftwaffe until the last day of the war.

These factories occupied 3 – 16 miles approximately for my fellow Americans and 5 to 26 kilometers in length for the rest of the world. Tunnel sizes ranged from 13 feet to 66 feet or four to twenty meters in width and five to fifteen meters in height; workshop sizes ranged from 42,651 to 80,202 square feet or 13,000 to 25,000 square meters.

Don’t get me started on the feet vs meter thing. It’s a thorn in my side that the US is so damn backwards. Anyway, it’s a lot of land mass.

By mid-October 1945, a report sent to the U.S. Air Force stated that many underground factories had been discovered, much more than previously thought. These underground facilities were found not only in Germany and Austria but also in France, Italy, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia.

The report stated that the Germans had managed to launch about 143 such factories by the end of the war. Another 107 factories were discovered, built or laid down at the end of the war, in addition to 600 caves and mines, many of which were turned into conveyor belts and weapon production laboratories. It can only be speculated what would have happened if the Germans had gone underground before the war began, concludes the report, clearly impressed by the scale of German underground construction.

On August 8, 1944, following Himmler's appointment as head of the Ministry of Armaments, Kammler became the chief executive of the "V-2" project.

Kammler managed the entire process, from production and placement to conducting military operations against England and the Netherlands. He personally directed the rocket attacks. This position, thanks to his attention to detail, allowed Kammler to study the entire process of managing the strategic weapons program, an opportunity that had not been available to anyone else in the third reich.

Himmlers Hirn heißt Heydrich und Himmlers Hirn heißt Kammler.

I’m going to go off on a tangent here. Himmler really didn’t have anything more than an average IQ from everything I have read over the years. He was a toady little man, not much to look at in the general sense. He was, however, excellent at picking his people. Hans Kammler was one of them.

You don’t get the equivalent of a PhD without attention to detail. Trust me, I know this as fact, personally. The sheer amount of attention to all the details and thinking outside the box is so danged important. With some people, it is dangerous.

The war was falling apart for Germany. Perhaps the public didn’t know that because of Goebbels’ propaganda, those that were in command? They knew. They were done. There was no chance of winning the war for the nazis.

Around the very end of January 1945, Kammler became the Hatler's authorized representative for the development of jet engines and the leader of all rocket programs, both defensive and offensive.

Hateler permanently transferred all responsibility for air armaments such as fighters, rockets, and bombers to Kammler. In early April 1945, when the Soviet army was already approaching Berlin, Hateler and Himmler handed over to Kammler all the secret weapons systems of the third reich, which had no equivalents among the countries of the Allies.

The work of the scientists in Kammler's headquarters as unparalleled among other late-war technologies, even the "V-1" and "V-2" projects seemed ordinary in comparison. The list of special projects included nuclear installations for rockets and aircraft, advanced guided projectiles, and anti-aircraft lasers.

An important point is that the testing was not carried out at "Skoda" itself but in field conditions. Thus, Kammler's Special Staff functioned as a coordinating research center.

After the meeting with Hateler on April 3, 1945, Kammler moved his headquarters (not to be confused with the Special Staff) from Berlin to Munich. Before leaving Berlin, he made a farewell visit to Speer, during which he hinted that Speer should also move to Munich and that the SS was attempting to eliminate Hateler.

Kammler then informed Speer that he planned to contact the Americans and offer them everything in exchange for his freedom - "jet planes, as well as A-4 rockets and other important developments." He also revealed that he was gathering all qualified experts in Upper Bavaria to hand them over to the U.S. Army.

"He offered me a chance to participate in his operation," wrote Speer, "which undoubtedly would work in my favor." Speer, however, is not a reliable witness and wrote/told a lot of lies in his work. Still, Speer declined.

It was unheard of that these sons of bitches in leadership could possibly believe that Kammler would/could/should work miracles. In April of 1945, Goebbels wrote in his diary: "The Hater had long negotiations with Obergruppenführer Kammler, who is responsible for the reform of the Luftwaffe. Kammler is doing his duties superbly, and great hopes are placed on him."

WHAT THE ABSOLUTE FUCK. I am utterly serious. Were these men delusional? The beginning of April. Hateler would commit suicide less than a month later and Goebbels could possibly believe this load of shite? My honest thoughts on Goebbels’ diaries were absolutely meant for someone else to read them by this point or earlier. He knew that the diaries would be scrutinized by others and so he would be the biggest supporter of nazism.

All these research programs represented by SS Obergruppenführer Hans Kammler, it is surprising that his name is hardly mentioned in references to the Luftwaffe or its major programs. However, despite this, Kammler was at the head of a top-secret research center. He was the ‘forgotten one’.  However, was this on purpose?

I’m all about forgetting nazis in a sense. Their names and legacies should be forgotten. It is not so simple. We must remember them, or it will happen again.

Throughout all of this. Throughout all the insane things that Kemmler had accomplished. How he was told to work faster and harder on setting up the camps, while he stated it was the conditions that were the problem. Those problems were the extreme cold, lack of supplies, and poor labor. When you use dying people for labor, there usually is a problem. Idiots.

Once again, what happened to him after the war was what truly interests me. He was one of hundreds, if not thousands of men that potentially could have done the exact same job with the exact same outcomes.

For a very long time it was thought that he committed suicide in 1945. The suicides after the war were numerous, over 7000 in Berlin alone.

Decades passed, it was assumed Kammler died by suicide or was killed shortly after liberation in 1945. Reuter’s book, however, demonstrates that Kammler was “delivered” to US authorities by rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, who feared that Kammler’s secrets — and colleagues — would fall into Russian hands.

Oh my, does that plot ever thicken.

“Kammler and the Americans created the deal wherein he gave them the rocket team, and they erased his past,” Reuter said. “As part of that deal, we covered up his death and the world accepted that he died.”

Remember, this accusation is that of a writer. I could easily tell you that my father’s fourth cousin twice removed was Kammler. Given that Ridding The World Of Nazis Is A Family Tradition, nah. Not feasible. I have that on a t-shirt.

Going back to Reuter, as part of “Operation Paperclip,” US authorities sought to capture German technical experts to use in the space program. Beginning in 1945, an estimated 5,000 German scientists and technicians were brought to the US, including “severely tainted men who were involved in the Holocaust and the use of slave labor.”

Are we great yet? Nope.

No released official documents have been found that list Kammler having been brought over to the US. No official documents have said he wasn’t. The problem with Kammler was quite simple, he knew too much. That made him a target. If you have a special target, you don’t go around being a pick me.

“Gerald Fleming, a leading Holocaust researcher, wanted certainty but could not find sufficient evidence to prove that the suicide narrative was not true. Fleming urged us not to let the story rest but to continue the research.

In the article „Ein inszenierter Selbstmord. Überlebte Hitlers „letzter Hoffnungsträger“, SS Obergruppenführer Hans Kammler den Krieg? [A staged suicide. Did Hitler’s “Last Hopeful,” SS Obergruppenführer Hans Kammler, Survive the War?], published in the Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaft in 2014, for the first time declassified documents and statements were presented which suggest that Hans Kammler was captured by the Counterintelligence Corps, an American military intelligence service. The most important evidence for this thesis was a report by special investigator Oscar Packe dated August 1949. Packe, who worked for the department of the U.S. military government in Hesse responsible for denazification, concluded his report as follows: “The suicide of the subject, suspected and allegedly confirmed by the witnesses, is refuted by the CIC’s precise information about his capture and escape in May 1945. Evidence that the subject is now in Soviet custody and is to work in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany could not be provided here.

Packe had been informed by the CIC of Kammler’s capture and subsequent escape. Was it possible for a high-ranking SS general and his staff to escape from American captivity? Was he really arrested with his staff at the Messerschmidt works in Oberammergau, as the Packe report states, “by American troops on 9 May”? And was able to escape from there with senior SS leaders of his staff? Did the events in fact take place near the underground Messerschmitt plant “Bergkristall” in Gusen, near Linz? It is likely that Packe did not learn the true circumstances of Kammler’s arrest from the Counter Intelligence Corps. Recently Donald W. Richardson, a special agent of the CIC and the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), has emerged as a key. Shortly before his death, he told his sons that he had brought Hans Kammler to the United States. For reasons of national security, he had to remain silent about it. Despite these sources and Richardson’s statement, doubts about the chain of circumstantial evidence persisted.” – The Wilson Center

In any case, Kammler’s disappearance was a great advantage to the rocket developers around Wernher von Braun. Why? They were able to blame all crimes against concentration camp inmates and forced laborers related to the production and use of V-weapons to the SS, presenting themselves as apolitical engineers. Apolitical. Right. As if anyone believed such a story. These men and women were useful. Very useful. Being useful gave them the freedom not to be hung at any of the numerous trials against the other nazis.

The biography of Hans Kammler must be corrected in a central point: It does not end on May 9, 1945. What happened after that can only be clarified after the discovery or the release of relevant documents as well as the interrogation records.

For now, at least we know that the bastard is dead. Pretty sure there is no way he would be alive at 124 years of age.  We also have no idea what the ever-loving fuck happened to one of the worst men of WWII.

[chic-a-gigot]

Mon journal favori, no. 6, 15 juin 1931, Paris. Bibliothèque nationale de France

La fraîche composition qui illustre si heureusement la première page de Mon Journal Favori vous présente un très charmant ensemble pour les jours de vacances.

Le Pull-over (dont le Patron Favori porte le no. 4472) est au tricot et peut être exécuté en deux tons camaïeu ou différents, suivant le goût personnel. Les indications nécessaires à l'exécution se trouvent très complètes à la page 12 de ce numéro.

Ce Pull-over se portera sur la Jupe no. 4252, extraite de nos Patrons Favoris; elle s'exécutera en Tweed, forme deux plis piqués sur le devant. un métrage de 1 m. 75 en 140 sera très suffisant.

—

The fresh composition which so happily illustrates the first page of Mon Journal Favori illustrates a very charming set for vacation days.

The Sweater (Patron Favori number 4472) is knitted and can be made in two monochrome or different tones, depending on personal taste. The instructions are included in full on page 12 of this issue.

This Sweater will be worn over Skirt no. 4252, taken from our Patrons Favoris; It will be made in Tweed, forms two stitched pleats on the front. a length of 1 m. 75 in 140 will be very sufficient.

[camisoledadparis]

THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more … November 10

1855 – Quaker poet and critic, Rufus Griswold, denounces Walt Whitman as a "scurvy fellow...indulging the vilest imaginings"

In the November 10, 1855, issue of The Criterion, Griswold anonymously reviewed the first edition of Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass, declaring: "It is impossible to image how any man's fancy could have conceived such a mass of stupid filth". Griswold charged that Whitman was guilty of "the vilest imaginings and shamefullest license", a "degrading, beastly sensuality." Referring to Whitman's poetry, Griswold said he left "this gathering of muck to the laws which... must have the power to suppress such gross obscenity." He ended his review with a phrase in Latin referring to "that horrible sin, among Christians not to be named", the stock phrase long associated with Christian condemnations of sodomy.

Griswold was the first person in the 19th century to publicly point to and stress the theme of erotic desire and acts between men in Whitman's poetry.

1879 – Patrick Pearse (also known as Pádraic or Pádraig Pearse (d.1916) was an Irish teacher, barrister, poet, writer, nationalist and political activist who was one of the leaders of the Easter Rising in 1916. Following his execution along with fifteen other leaders, Pearse came to be seen by many as the embodiment of the rebellion.

When the Easter Rising began on Easter Monday, 24 April 1916, it was Pearse who read the Proclamation of the Irish Republic from the steps of the General Post Office, the headquarters of the rising. After six days of fighting, heavy civilian casualties and great destruction of property, Pearse issued the order to surrender.

Pearse and fourteen other leaders, including his brother Willie, were court-martialled and executed by firing squad. Thomas Clarke, Thomas MacDonagh and Pearse himself were the first of the rebels to be executed, on the morning of 3 May 1916. Pearse was 36 years old at the time of his death. Roger Casement, who had tried unsuccessfully to recruit an insurgent force among Irish-born prisoners of war from the Irish Brigade in Germany, was hanged in London the following August.

The suggestion that the unmarried Pearse, a hero of Irish nationalism, may have been homosexual, has drawn fierce opposition from some Irish people. However, his biographer Ruth Dudley Edwards is clear that although celibate, he was undoubtedly physically attracted to young men men and boys.

1879 – The poet and influential critic Vachel Lindsay was born on this date (d.1931). His exuberant recitation of some of his work led some critics to compare it to jazz poetry despite his persistent protests. Because of his use of American Midwest themes he also became known as the "Prairie Troubador."

Lindsay's fame as a poet grew in the 1910s. Because Harriet Monroe showcased him with two other Illinois poets — Carl Sandburg and Edgar Lee Masters — his name became linked to theirs. The success of either of the other two, in turn, seemed to help the third.

Edgar Lee Masters published a biography of Lindsay in 1935 (four years after its subject's death) entitled 'Vachel Lindsay: A Poet in America'. In 1915, Lindsay gave a poetry reading to President Woodrow Wilson and the entire Cabinet. Lindsay was well known throughout the nation, and especially in Illinois, because of his travels which were sometimes recorded in the front page of every newspaper.

He is probably best known for this poetic apostrophe to the Salvation Army in "General William Booth Enters Heaven," although it is questionable whether he ever made it past the pearly Gates himself, since he not only liked boys too much , but also ended his days a suicide.

In his 40s, Lindsay lost his heart to the dazzlingly good-looking Australian composer and pianist, Percy Grainger, as had the Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg before him.

Lindsay killed himself (horribly, swallowing Lysol) in 1931, the year before Hart Crane leapt into the sea. His only biography was published during the Eisenhower years, a decade before homosexuality was officially invented. If it took biographers almost a century to acknowledge Whitman's Gayness, Lindsay should be due for a really serious biography around 2021.

Lindsay is credited with having "discovered" the poet Langston Hughes while staying at the Wardman Park Hotel in Washington, DC. Lindsay was dining in the hotel restaurant and the young Hughes was his busboy. When Hughes came to take his food away he left a number of his poems at Lindsay's table. Lindsay, upon reading them, was moved to declare the next day in his daily column to having "discovered a great Negro American poet." It launched Hughes' career.

1913 – James Broughton (d.1999) was an American poet, and poetic filmmaker. He was part of the San Francisco Renaissance. He was an early bard of the Radical Faeries as well as a charter member of The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence serving her community as Sister Sermonetta.

Born to wealthy parents, he lost his father early to the 1918 influenza epidemic and spent the rest of his life getting over his high-strung, overbearing mother.

Before he was three, "Sunny Jim" experienced a transformational visit from his muse, Hermy, which he describes in his autobiography, Coming Unbuttoned (1993):

I remember waking in the dark and hearing my parents arguing in the next room. But a more persistent sound, a kind of whirring whistle, spun a light across the ceiling. I stood up in my crib and looked into the backyard. Over a neighbor's palm tree a pulsing headlamp came whistling directly toward me. When it had whirled right up to my window, out of its radiance stepped a naked boy. He was at least three years older than I but he looked all ages at once. He had no wings, but I knew he was angel-sent: his laughing beauty illuminated the night and his melodious voice enraptured my ears ... He insisted I would always be a poet even if I tried not to be ... Despite what I might hear to the contrary the world was not a miserable prison, it was a playground for a nonstop tournament between stupidity and imagination. If I followed the game sharply enough, I could be a useful spokesman for Big Joy.

Broughton was kicked out of military school for having an affair with a classmate, dropped out of Stanford before graduating, and spent time in Europe during the 1950s, where he received an award in Cannes from Jean Cocteau for the "poetic fantasy" of his film The Pleasure Garden, made in England with partner Kermit Sheets.

"Cinema saved me from suicide when I was 32 by revealing to me a wondrous reality: the love between fellow artists," Broughton wrote. This theme carried him through his 85 years. "It was as important to live poetically as to write poems."

Despite many love affairs during the San Francisco Beat Scene, Broughton put off marriage until age 49, when, steeped in his explorations of Jungian psychology, he married Susanna Hart in a three-day ceremony on the Pacific coast documented by his friend, the experimental filmmaker Stan Brakhage. Susanna's theatrical background and personality made for a great playmate; they had two children. And they built a great community among the creative spirits of San Francisco.

In 1967s "summer of love," Broughton made a film, The Bed, a celebration of the dance of life which broke taboos against frontal nudity and won prizes at many film festivals. It rekindled Broughton's filmmaking and led to more tributes to the human body (The Golden Positions), the eternal child (This Is It), the eternal return (The Water Circle), the eternal moment (High Kukus), and the eternal feminine (Dreamwood). "These eternalities praised the beauty of humans, the surprises of soul, and the necessity of merriment," Broughton wrote.

In the Coming Unbuttoned, Broughton remarks on his love affairs with both men and women. Among his male lovers was gay activist Harry Hay.

Hermy appeared again to the older Broughton in the person of a twenty-five-year-old Canadian film student named Joel Singer. Broughton's meeting with Singer was a life-changing, life-determining moment that animated his consciousness with a power that lasted until his death. In Joel Singer he found a creative as well as emotional partner.

With Singer, Broughton traveled and made more films - Hermes Bird (1979), a slow-motion look at an erection shot with the camera developed to photograph atomic bomb explosions, The Gardener of Eden (1981), filmed when they lived in Sri Lanka, Devotions (1983), which takes delight in friendly things men can do together from the odd to the rapturous, and Scattered Remains (1988), a cheerfully death-obsessed tribute to Broughton's poetry and filmmaking.

He died in May, 1999 with champagne on his lips, in the house in Port Townsend, Washington where he and Joel lived for 10 years. Before he died, he said, "My creeping decrepitude has crept me all the way to the crypt." His gravestone in a Port Townsend cemetery reads, "Adventure - not predicament."

God and Fuck belong together Both are sacred and profane God (the Divine) a dirty word used for damning Fuck (the sublime) a dirty term of depredation God and Fuck are so much alike they might be synonymous glories I'd even go so far as to say God is the Fuck of all Fucks And boy He has a Body like you've never seen - From Special Deliveries by James Broughton

Richard Burton (R) with Elizabeth Taylor

1925 – Richard Burton, CBE (born Richard Walter Jenkins Jr.;d.1984) was a Welsh actor. Noted for his mellifluous baritone voice, Burton established himself as a formidable Shakespearean actor in the 1950s, and he gave a memorable performance of Hamlet in 1964. He was called "the natural successor to Olivier" by critic and dramaturge Kenneth Tynan. An alcoholic, Burton's failure to live up to those expectations disappointed critics and colleagues and fuelled his legend as a great thespian wastrel.

Burton was nominated for an Academy Award seven times, but never won an Oscar. He was a recipient of BAFTAs, Golden Globes, and Tony Awards for Best Actor. In the mid-1960s, Burton ascended into the ranks of the top box office stars. By the late 1960s, Burton was one of the highest-paid actors in the world, receiving fees of $1 million or more plus a share of the gross receipts. Burton remains closely associated in the public consciousness with his second wife, actress Elizabeth Taylor. The couple's turbulent relationship was rarely out of the news.

Burton was married five times, twice consecutively to Taylor. From 1949 until 1963, he was married to Sybil Williams. His marriages to Taylor lasted from 15 March 1964 to 26 June 1974 and from 10 October 1975 to 29 July 1976. Their first wedding was at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Montreal. Of their marriage, Taylor proclaimed, "I'm so happy you can't believe it. This marriage will last forever." Their second wedding took place sixteen months after their divorce, in Chobe National Park in Botswana. Taylor and Eddie Fisher adopted a daughter from Germany, Maria Burton (born 1 August 1961), who was re-adopted by Burton after he and Taylor married. Burton also re-adopted Taylor and producer Mike Todd's daughter, Elizabeth Frances "Liza" Todd (born 6 August 1957), who had been first adopted by Fisher.

Burton acknowledged homosexual experiences as a young actor on the London stage in the 1950s. In a February 1975 interview with his friend, David Lewin, he said he "tried" homosexuality. He also suggested that perhaps all actors were latent homosexuals, and "we cover it up with drink". In 2000 Ellis Amburn's biography of Elizabeth Taylor suggested that Burton had an affair with Laurence Olivier and tried to seduce Eddie Fisher, although this was strongly denied by Burton's younger brother Graham Jenkins.

1955 – Roland Emmerich is a German film director, screenwriter, and producer. His films, most of which are Hollywood productions filmed in English, have grossed more than $3 billion worldwide, more than those of any other European director. His films have grossed just over $1 billion in the United States, making him the country's 14th-highest grossing director of all time.

He began his work in the film industry by directing the film The Noah's Ark Principle as part of his university thesis and also co-founded Centropolis Entertainment in 1985 with his sister. He is a collector of art and an active campaigner for the lesbian and gay community, himself being openly gay. He is also a campaigner for an awareness of global warming and equal rights.

in 1990, Emmerich was hired to replace director Andrew Davis for the action movie Universal Soldier. The film was released in 1992, and has since been followed by two direct-to-video sequels, a theatrical sequel, and another sequel released in 2010.

Emmerich next helmed the 1994 science-fiction film Stargate. At the time, it set a record for the highest-grossing opening weekend for a film released in the month of October. It became more commercially successful than most film industry insiders had anticipated, and spawned a highly popular media franchise.

Emmerich then directed Independence Day, an alien invasion feature that became the first film to gross $100 million in less than a week and went on to become one of the most successful films of all time. His next film, the much-hyped Godzilla, did not meet its anticipated box office success and was largely panned by critics. Taking a short break from science-fiction, Emmerich next directed the American Revolutionary War film The Patriot.

After teaming up with new writing partner Harald Kloser, Emmerich returned once again to directing a visual effects-laden adventure with 2004's The Day After Tomorrow. Soon afterwards, he founded Reelmachine, another film production company based in Germany.

Emmerich's most recent efforts have been 10,000 BC, a film about the journeys of a prehistoric tribe, and 2012, an apocalyptic film inspired by the theory that the Mayans prophesied the world's ending in 2012.

In 2006, he pledged $150,000 to the Legacy Project, a campaign dedicated to Gay and Lesbian film preservation. Emmerich, who is openly Gay, made the donation on behalf of Outfest, making it the largest gift in the festival's history.

1986 – Andy Mientus is an American stage and television actor. He is known for his role as Kyle Bishop in the television series Smash.

Mientus has toured with the first national touring company of Spring Awakening as Hanschen and appeared in the 2012 Off-Broadway revival of Carrie: The Musical.

In 2013, Mientus was cast in season two of the musical drama television series Smash as series regular Kyle Bishop. Following the cancellation of Smash, Mientus and co-stars Jeremy Jordan and Krysta Rodriguez joined the cast of Hit List, the real-world staging of the fictional rock musical created for season two of Smash. The show ran for three performances on December 8—9 at 54 Below.

Mientus made his Broadway debut in the 2014 revival of Les Misérables as Marius.

In 2014, Mientus appeared in several episodes of the ABC Family series Chasing Life. That same year, he was cast in a recurring role on the CW series The Flash as the Pied Piper.

Mientus is openly bisexual. He is engaged to fellow Broadway actor Michael Arden. Mientus and Arden both planned to propose to each other on the same exact day while on a trip in England. Michael had planned a scavenger hunt for Andy to complete and eventually lead to a proposal. However, Andy was able to execute his proposal first. Andy's proposal was a video of a young boy talking about marriage which quickly cut to all of their friends saying why Michael should say yes. The couple set the wedding to take place Autumn of 2015.

1992 – The Louisiana Baptist Convention voted 581-199 to exclude congregations which condone homosexuality. A similar resolution was approved the same day by the North Carolina State Baptist convention.

[opera-ghosts]

OTD in Music History: British composer and suffragist Dame Ethel Smyth (1858 - 1944), the first female composer to ever be granted a damehood (in 1922), is born in London. Few figures in musical history have led a more colorful life than Smyth. After having a bitter fight with her father over her desire to pursue music as a career, Smyth was allowed to study composition at the Leipzig Conservatory. Although she left after only a year (disillusioned with what she considered to be the low standard of teaching), her brief attendance there put her in contact with a host of musical luminaries including Clara Schumann (1819 - 1896), Johannes Brahms (1833 - 1897), Pyotr Tchaikovsky (1840 - 1893), Antonin Dvorak (1841 - 1904), and Edvard Grieg (1843 - 1907)... and upon her return to England, she also formed a fast friendship with Sir Arthur Sullivan (1842 - 1900). Smyth's extensive body of work includes two notable operas: - For more than a century, "Der Wald" (1903) claimed the distinction of being the only opera composed by a woman to have ever been produced at New York's Metropolitan Opera (until Kaija Saariaho's [1952 - 2023] "L'Amour de loin" was premiered in 2016). - "The Wreckers" (1906) is also widely admired, and considered by some critics to be the greatest and most historically important British opera composed between Henry Purcell (1659 - 1695) and Benjamin Britten (1913 - 1976). Smyth’s last major completed work was a symphony entitled "The Prison" (1931). By the mid-1930s, she had gone almost completely deaf. But that's not all. Smyth was *also* a prominent British suffragist (she was imprisoned for her political activism) who lived openly as a lesbian at a time when such things were almost unheard of. At the age of 71, she fell in love with writer Virginia Woolf (1882 - 1941), who was nearly 25 years her junior. Woolf was both alarmed and amused, comparing it to “being caught by a giant crab." The two women eventually settled into a close platonic friendship. PICTURED: A formal portrait photograph showing the young Smyth her beloved dog, Marco. Also shown is an 1931 autograph letter written and signed by Smyth concerning her musical activities.

Smyth rescued Marco from the streets of Vienna during his student days at the Conservatory. In her memoirs, Smyth later described Marco as “half St. Bernard, and the rest whatever you please.” Marco quickly became the joy of Smyth's life, and he would happily spend hours lying quietly by her side as she composed -- often with his head resting on the pedals of her piano. Marco’s most infamous moment undoubtedly occurred when Smyth was invited to attend a rehearsal of Johannes Brahms' (1833 - 1897) F minor Piano Quintet that was taking place at Brahms's apartment. Although Smyth wisely left Marco tethered outside, he simply refused to be parted from her for that long -- and so at some point while the young Smyth was inside seated at the piano and turning pages for Brahms, Marco managed to get loose from his leash, dash up two flights of stairs, nuzzle open the unlocked front door, and make his way into the drawing room where Brahms and four local Viennese musicians were rehearsing. Bounding onto the scene, Marco immediately dove under the piano (overturning the cellist's music stand in the process) and wiggled his way in between Smyth and the astonished composer. As Smyth later described it, Brahms “rose to the occasion” and “laughed till he got purple in the face" while happily petting Marco. (No word on how the cellist reacted.)

[thepastisalreadywritten]

Hachiko: The world's most loyal dog turns 100

2 July 2023

The Chinese tagline on the movie poster says it all: "I will wait for you, no matter how long it takes."

It tells the true story of Hachiko, the faithful dog that continued to wait for its master at a train station in Japan long after his death.

The cream white Akita Inu, born 100 years ago, has been memorialised in everything from books to movies to the cult science fiction sitcom Futurama.

And the Chinese iteration - the third after a Japanese version in 1987, and the Richard Gere-starrer in 2009 - is a hit at the box office.

There have been tales of other devoted hounds such as Greyfriars Bobby, but none with the global impact of Hachiko.

A bronze statue of him has stood outside Shibuya Station in Tokyo, where he waited in vain for a decade, since 1948.

The statue was first erected in 1934 before being recycled for the war effort during World War Two.

Japanese schoolchildren are taught the story of Chuken Hachiko - or loyal dog Hachiko - as an example of devotion and fidelity.

''Hachiko represents the ideal Japanese citizen with his unquestioning devotion," says Professor Christine Yano of the University of Hawaii - "loyal, reliable, obedient to a master, understanding, without relying upon rationality, their place in the larger scheme of things."

The story of Hachiko

Hachiko was born on 10 November 1923 in the city of Odate in Akita prefecture, the original home of Akitas.

A large-sized Japanese dog, the Akita is one of the country's oldest and most popular breeds.

Designated by the Japanese government as a national icon in 1931, they were once trained to hunt animals like wild boar and elk.

"Akita dogs are calm, sincere, intelligent, and brave [and] obedient to their masters," said Eietsu Sakuraba, author of an English language children's book about Hachiko.

"On the other hand, it also has a stubborn personality and is wary of anyone other than its master."

The year Hachiko was born, Hidesaburo Ueno, a renowned agricultural professor and a dog lover, asked a student to find him an Akita puppy.

After a gruelling train journey, the puppy arrived at the Ueno residence in Shibuya district on 15 January 1924, where it was initially thought dead.

According to Hachiko's biographer, Prof Mayumi Itoh, Ueno and his wife Yae nursed him back to health over the next six months.

Ueno named him Hachi, or eight in Japanese. Ko is an honorific bestowed by Ueno's students.

The long wait

Ueno took a train to work several times a week. He was accompanied to Shibuya station by his three dogs, including Hachiko. The trio would then wait there for his return in the evening.

On 21 May 1925, Ueno, then 53, died of a cerebral hemorrhage. Hachiko had been with him for just 16 months.

"While people were attending the wake, Hachi smelled Dr Ueno from the house and went inside the living room. He crawled under the coffin and refused to move," writes Prof Itoh.

Hachiko spent the next few months with different families outside Shibuya but eventually, in the summer of 1925, he ended up with Ueno's gardener Kikusaburo Kobayashi.

Having returned to the area where his late master lived, Hachiko soon resumed his daily commute to the station, rain or shine.

"In the evening, Hachi stood on four legs at the ticket gate and looked at each passenger as if he were looking for someone," writes Prof Itoh.

Station employees initially saw him as a nuisance. Yakitori vendors would pour water on him and little boys bullied and hit him.

However, he gained nationwide fame after Japanese daily Tokyo Asahi Shimbun wrote about him in October 1932.

The station received donations of food for Hachiko each day, while visitors came from far and wide to see him.

Poems and haikus were written about him. A fundraising event in 1934 to make a statue of him reportedly drew a crowd of 3,000.

Hachiko's eventual death on 8 March 1935 at the age of 11 made the front page of many newspapers. He was found on a street in Shibuya.

In March 2011, scientists finally settled the cause of death of Hachikō: the dog had both terminal cancer and a filaria infection.

There were also four yakitori skewers in Hachikō's stomach, but the skewers did not damage his stomach nor cause his death.

At his funeral, Buddhist monks offered prayers for him and dignitaries read eulogies. Thousands visited his statue in the following days.

In impoverished post-war Japan, a fundraising drive for a new statue of Hachiko even managed to raise 800,000 yen, an enormous sum at the time, worth about 4bn yen (£22m; $28m) today.

"In retrospect, I feel that he knew that Dr Ueno would not come back, but he kept waiting - Hachiko taught us the value of keeping faith in someone," wrote Takeshi Okamoto in a newspaper article in 1982.

As a high school student, he had seen Hachiko at the station daily.

Remembering Hachiko

Every year on 8 April, a memorial service for Hachiko is held outside Shibuya Station.

His statue is often decorated with scarves, Santa hats and, most recently, a surgical mask.

His mount is on display at the National Museum of Nature and Science in Tokyo.

Some of his remains are interred at the Aoyama Cemetery, alongside Ueno and Yae.

Statues of him have also been cast in Odate, Ueno's hometown Hisai, the University of Tokyo and Rhode Island, the American setting for the 2009 movie.

Odate also has a series of events lined up this year for his 100th birthday.

Will the world's most loyal dog still be celebrated a century from now? Prof Yano says yes because she believes the "heroism of Hachiko" is not defined by any particular period - rather it is timeless.

Mr Sakuraba is equally optimistic.

"Even 100 years from now, this unconditional, devoted love will remain unchanged, and the story of Hachiko will live on forever."

🤍🐕🤍

[the-rewatch-rewind]

Another new episode!

Script below the break.

Hello and welcome back to The Rewatch Rewind! My name is Jane, and this is the podcast where I count down my top 40 most frequently rewatched movies in a 20-year period. Today I will be talking about number 15 on my list: Columbia Pictures’ 1940 fast-talking comedy His Girl Friday, directed by Howard Hawks, written by Charles Lederer (and uncredited Ben Hecht and Morrie Ryskind), based on the play “The Front Page” by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, and starring Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell, and Ralph Bellamy.

After a four-month absence, reporter Hildy Johnson (Rosalind Russell) returns to the office of The Morning Post to inform her ex-husband/boss, editor Walter Burns (Cary Grant), that she is about to marry insurance agent Bruce Baldwin (Ralph Bellamy), settle down, and quit the newspaper business for good. Desperate to win her back, both professionally and romantically, Walter entices Hildy to write one last great story for the paper, while doing everything he can to sabotage her relationship with Bruce.

I don’t remember any of my first impressions of this movie, or if I had seen it before I started keeping track. I assume it was one of the many old movies I got from the library relatively early in my foray into Old Hollywood, so I might have seen it in 2002. I definitely saw it once in 2003, once in 2005, once each in 2007 through 2009, three times in 2010, three times in 2012, once in each year from 2013 through 2016, twice in 2017, once in 2018, twice in 2019, and twice in 2022. I know that in 2010, I took a class at community college called “film as literature,” in which some assignments involved picking a movie and three different aspects of filmmaking, and discussing how those three aspects enhanced the story of that particular film. The instructor advised us to watch the movie we were writing about three times, focusing on a different aspect each time, and His Girl Friday was one of the movies I wrote a paper like that about (I focused on dialogue, props, and lighting), so that explains the three times in 2010. But I can’t think of a good explanation for why I watched it three times again in 2012, aside from the fact that it’s a great movie that I always enjoy watching. It’s also one that feels particularly appropriate to include in my annual Cary Grant birthday marathon, because it happened to come out on his birthday in 1940, so that’s part of why I watch it almost every year.

By far the best and most noteworthy aspect of this movie is its rapid-fire dialogue. Yes, a lot of old movies are very dialogue-heavy with people talking pretty fast, but like, His Girl Friday takes it to a whole other level. A typical movie averages around 90 words of dialogue per minute; His Girl Friday averages around 240. Many lines were specifically written so that the beginning and the end didn’t matter, allowing the actors to talk over each other, as people do in real conversations, without preventing the audience from understanding what was going on. All the fast, overlapping talking is particularly impressive given that multi-track recording hadn’t been developed yet, so they couldn’t adjust the volumes of different speakers separately in post-production; they just turned different overhead microphones on and off so the primary speaker was louder when they were recording, with some scenes reportedly requiring up to 35 switches – shout out to that sound department. At the time, the record for fastest film dialogue was held by the 1931 version of The Front Page, and director Howard Hawks was determined to break it with this adaptation, which he later proved he had done by screening the two versions next to each other. He also encouraged the actors to improvise, which made filming take longer – as it had with his earlier Bringing Up Baby – but helped the conversations feel even more authentic. Rosalind Russell felt that Cary Grant had more good lines in the script than she did, so she hired her own writer to help enhance her dialogue. Apparently at one point, after she did something unscripted, Grant broke character and said into camera, “Is she going to do that?” which Hawks really wanted to keep in the movie, but ultimately didn’t make the final cut. But several noteworthy ad-libs remained, including at least two, possibly three, amazing inside jokes. One is when Walter says, “He looks like that fellow in the movies…Ralph Bellamy” about Bruce, who did, in fact, look exactly like Ralph Bellamy, the actor playing him. And then there’s the part when the mayor says, “You’re through,” and Walter replies with, “The last man that said that to me was Archie Leach,” in reference to Cary Grant’s birth name – yes, he had the same birth surname as me, but we’re not related as far as I know. And the third, which has not been officially confirmed as an ad-lib or intentional reference but might have been, is when Walter calls the man hiding in a desk a “mock turtle,” which was the character Grant played in the 1933 Alice in Wonderland movie.

So basically, this film was made specifically for Cary Grant fans, and that’s a big part of why I love it. Walter Burns is one of his less likable characters – he’s selfish and deceptive and manipulative – but also one of his most fun to watch. Grant nails every beat of the breakneck-paced dialogue, knowing exactly when to pull focus toward himself and when to fade back to let his scene partner shine through. He still keeps going in the background, though, which helps make this movie especially rewatchable. As you can probably tell from the mere existence of this podcast, I enjoy rewatching movies anyway, but with His Girl Friday in particular, there are so many excellent moments that I didn’t notice until I’d seen the whole film many times, and I’m still noticing new things with every rewatch. While you don’t need to hear the overlapping bits of dialogue to follow the movie, once you’re familiar with the story it’s very fun to go back and listen for the parts you missed before. And several actors – Grant in particular – make some great reaction faces in the background that are worth watching out for. So if you’ve only seen this movie once, I would highly recommend revisiting it.

And it’s not just Cary Grant – Rosalind Russell is absolutely fabulous in this movie. Hildy Johnson was a man in The Front Page, but when Howard Hawks heard his female secretary reading the lines during auditions, he thought they sounded great coming from a woman and decided to turn Hildy into Walter’s ex-wife. It would have been nice if they could have changed one of the main characters into a woman without making her automatically romantically involved with the other main character, but we can’t have everything. Many actresses were considered but ended up either turning it down or being too expensive to hire. Russell knew she was not a top choice and was apparently very insecure about that, but she had no reason to be because she was perfect. All the reporters in the movie talk ridiculously fast, but she leaves them in the dust and makes it look easy. It took me many takes just to quote part of one of her many rapid monologues at the end of last episode without tripping over my words; I don’t know how she did it. And while she’s talking a mile a minute, she’s also portraying an incredibly layered and nuanced character. The wonderful character actors playing the other reporters do a great job of conveying that they have embraced the cold, detached mindset of caring more about the scoop than the story itself. Hildy shares this to a certain extent, but she hasn’t completely lost her sense of empathy the way they have. She fits in with the guys, but she’s also better than them, both as a journalist and as a human being, without seeming too perfect to be realistic, which is an incredibly complex and difficult balance to strike, but again, Rosalind Russell nails it. Much as I love Grant’s performance, Russell is really the glue that holds the whole thing together, and she commits to that role completely.

Hildy is such a strong character that I’m always disappointed when she goes back to Walter at the end. She is clearly a much better match with him than with Bruce, whose slow, deliberate speech contrasts rather jarringly with Hildy and Walter’s snappy patter. But Walter has learned exactly zero lessons by the end of the movie, and there is no reason to believe that any of the problems with their first marriage will ever be resolved. Throughout the movie, Hildy is torn between wanting the domestic life of Bruce’s wife and the more hectic life of a newspaper reporter that still has a hold on her. When Walter tells her she can’t quit because she’s a newspaperman, she replies that that’s why she’s leaving, so she can be a woman. But as much as she complains about it, she makes it pretty clear that she does love being a reporter. I think there is a part of her that genuinely likes the idea of settling down as a housewife, but it seems like the main reason she wants to do that is because society is telling her that’s what women are supposed to do. So I’m very glad the movie doesn’t make her marry Bruce. I also recognize that at the time it was rather radical to suggest that a woman should pursue a career in something other than homemaking if she wants to, let alone suggest that she doesn’t have to completely give up the idea of having a husband to do so. In 1940 it was highly unusual to show a man wanting his wife to also have a career like Walter does. So from that perspective it is kind of nice to see them get back together. But at the same time, he treats her pretty terribly, and it kind of feels like it’s saying that a career gal should be happy with any man she can manage to get, regardless of how slimy he is. Not that Hildy doesn’t also treat Walter pretty terribly too. I guess they show their affection by hurling insults at each other, which is a type of relationship that makes no sense to me, but they seem to be on the same page about it. Still, I would love to see Hildy walk out on both Walter and Bruce like the strong, independent woman she is. At least the movie makes it clear that, despite its title, she is nobody’s assistant, or “girl Friday.”

The progressive for 1940 but doesn’t quite work now theme extends beyond feminism. Besides the Walter/Hildy/Bruce love triangle, the other main storyline in the movie involves a man named Earl Williams, played by John Qualen, who is about to be hanged for killing a policeman, despite some legitimate questions regarding his sanity. Walter wants Hildy to do one final interview with Earl to show that he definitely wasn’t responsible for his actions, and that he’s being strategically executed a few days before an election so the incumbent sheriff and mayor will look tough on crime and win. Most of the reporters don’t seem to care, asking the sheriff if he can move the execution up a few hours so it can make their morning editions. The sheriff refuses, but it is very clear that he could not care less about upholding the law, and same with the mayor, because when a messenger from the governor arrives with a reprieve, they try to bribe him to leave and come back later so they can still execute Williams and pretend the reprieve arrived too late. And it’s not just the politicians who are corrupt. Hildy bribes a prison guard twice: first to get an interview with Earl Williams, and then to find out how he managed to get a gun and escape. Then when Hildy and Walter find Williams, they hide him, not because they think he’s innocent and want to save him, but because they want to be able to turn him in after they’ve written the story of how they captured him. The movie’s statements about the way American society treats working-class people on the fringes, like Earl, and the way the criminal justice system is easily manipulated for political or financial gain, are honestly still pretty accurate, for the most part. But in a bizarre twist, Walter tells Bruce and Hildy that the policeman Earl shot was black, and that the politicians are trying to get votes from black people by executing his white killer, which is just, so completely backwards from how anything actually works that it kind of detracts from the legitimate points the movie does make. Everything about this story just screams late 1930s/early 1940s, from the characters’ world views to the costumes to the current event references, which makes sense given when the movie was made, but is completely inconsistent with the written prologue at the beginning, which states: “It all happened in the dark ages of the newspaper game – when to a reporter getting that story justified anything short of murder. Incidentally, you will see in this picture no resemblance to the men and women of the press today. Ready? Well, once upon a time—” It’s like, nice try, but in 1940 you can’t pretend this is set in a bygone era and then talk about Hitler and the European war. I don’t think they were really fooling anyone, but at least this allowed the filmmakers to get away with criticizing journalists without getting sued or censored.

Speaking of being censored, one of the few female characters in this movie, Mollie Malloy (played by Helen Mack), kind of seems like she’s supposed to be a prostitute, but of course they weren’t allowed to say that so it’s not super clear. What we do know is that she befriended Earl Williams shortly before he was arrested and has visited him in jail, and that the press has been inaccurately representing the nature of Earl and Mollie’s relationship. I don’t know if it was partly because of the Hays Code that they specifically state that Earl and Mollie haven’t slept together, but regardless of the reason, I’m always a fan of platonic male/female friendship. And the way the movie shows that they care about each other deeply in a non-sexual way, while portraying the reporters as wrong for sexualizing their relationship, feels almost like it’s saying “asexual rights” and we love to see it. We don’t really know what’s going to happen to Earl and Mollie after the events of the film, but I hope that Earl gets the mental health care he needs – he won’t because it’s 1940 but we can pretend – and that Mollie fully recovers from jumping out of the window – we know she’s alive but not how badly she’s hurt – and that they remain close friends.

While this movie touches on a lot of dark themes, overall the tone is lighthearted. It feels like it’s exposing the world for the hellscape that it is and laughing at it. And while some of its attitudes feel very outdated and problematic, that mood is still relatable. His Girl Friday is hectic and chaotic and screwball, but it manages to remain at least somewhat grounded and real. So watching it can feel like either escaping from the real world or looking into a mirror held up to the real world, depending on what the viewer chooses to focus on. This makes it an appropriate movie to watch in many different moods, which helps explain why I revisit it so often. That and the incredible fast-talking performances that I’m still in awe of. And, of course, Cary Grant’s presence always helps.

Thank you for listening to me discuss another of my most frequently rewatched movies. Next up is the fourth and longest movie I watched 22 times in 20 years, which is also from the 1940s, so stay tuned for another oldie. It is also probably the most disturbing movie on this list, just to warn anyone who may be watching along. As always, I will leave you with a quote from that next movie: “Are you suggesting that this is a knife I hold in my hand?”

[gatutor]

Cartel película "Un gran reportaje" (The front page) 1931, de Lewis Milestone.

[elskanellis]

Getting to know me

Thanks for tagging me @goblinmatriarch (her delightful answers are here)

Three ships: Drarry (HP), Maxiel (F1), Spirk (TOS)

First ship: the first time I was outraged that two characters did not get together in canon was Anne/Diana.

Last song: "Who Is It (Carry my joy the left, carry my pain on the right)," Björk

Last movie: Frankenstein (1931). With the 12yo, who enjoyed it, and whom we will be showing Young Frankenstein (1974) next.

Currently reading: Go Down Together by Jeff Guinn. I'm hip-deep in a Bonnie & Clyde / Barrow gang research-hole–slash-hyperfixation right now. The book is fine. If I had world enough and time, I would instead be reading the entire 948-page FBI file on the Barrow gang, made available online (thank you, FOIA). I paused Wolf Hall to pursue this avenue, and will shortly go back to it.

Last thing I wrote: this drarry microfic and my contribution to the HP Law of Attraction Fest.

Currently writing: anon fic for unnamed fest

Are you named after anyone? YES! My first name is after my mom's grandmother. My middle name I chose and is in honor of (among others) Emily Brontë.

Favourite subject in school: any foreign language.

Do you have kids? Two! (Only one of them can handle James Whale horror films. The other one is afraid of the Arthur version of The Tell-Tale Heart.)

Do you use sarcasm a lot? I used to, but then I found out that I was a really poor judge of .. I guess the trajectory of my sarcasm? Where it would land, basically. And what I'd hoped would be witty and suave might just as well be cruel in the end. I enjoy sarcasm in other people but rarely use it myself.

What sports do you play/have you played? As a child I joined a municipal soccer league and was literally laughed off the team.

What's the first thing you notice about people? Their.... mien, I guess? This question confuses me.

Any special talents: I can sing "Landslide" in front of other people without crying.

Where were you born? Kentucky, USA

What are your hobbies? Reading, writing and avoiding writing, knitting, tarot, looking at things and talking about them. Currently I'm learning about the Barrow Gang (as mentioned) and I just started studying Uzbek.

Height: Six feet even, 182.ish cm.

Dream job: [redacted] because it's my job now, just without any pressures of capitalism.

Tagging, if you'd like to do it and no pressure etc, @citrusses , @sweet-s0rr0w , @hmmihaventdecidedyet , and anyone else who wants to do this!

[howardhawkshollywood]

It was Howard Hawks' idea to change Hildy Johnson in The Front Page (1931) from a male to a female in His Girl Friday (1940), creating a terrific battle of the sexes between Rosalind and Cary Grant.

[lazaruspiss]

Looking thru old books

Alice In Wonderland And Through The Looking Glass (copyright 1946)

The Winston Simplified Dictionary Intermediate Edition (copyright 1929)

OH MY GOD THIS DICTIONARY. someone who owned it before me wrote notes on the spread of world flags

Girl what did argentine do. That aside tho, its a really interesting page. Flags have changed a lot, even some country names are slightly different.

The Complete Poetical Works Of William Woodsworth Student's Cambridge Edition (copyright 1904)

A past owner wrote down page numbers in the front cover. Looks like they left personal notes throughout.

Princess Polly

No date anywhere. I'd have to track it down based on the cover.

She was my favorite book growing up. She and Alice were the best that little me knew.

Standard French Grammar (copyright 1931)

The Way of Life of Wu Ming Fu (copyright 1942)

The Music Hour First Book (copyright 1927, 1928)

The Fox Went Out on a Chilly Night (copyright 1961, the song it illustrates is copyrighted 1945)

And I have the copy of Aesop's Fables that I mentioned earlier, no copyright year but possibly from 1889

[raynbowclown]

The Front Page 1931

THE FRONT PAGE follows hard-boiled crime reporter Pat O’Brien who’s quitting the business to marry his sweetheart. But when political radical George E. Stone escapes police custody, editor Adolphe Menjou sees an opportunity to keep him from leaving… Continue reading The Front Page 1931

[captaincolossal]

Anyway, I don't know, more podcasts and studio work. It's...hard to muster any motivtion to do the studio work, since sales have been what they are, but also I have an order to get done, and I have to make enough stuff to fill the kiln to do a firing cycle to finish the order to get a check, so. That's where I'm at.

I'm also trying some smaller items, which is always sort of a double edged sword, because I get not wanting to buy a fifty dollar mug. But I put a lot more hand decorating work into the bigger, more expensive mugs, and I can't put the same amount of hand decorating into a smaller piece and charge less. I mean. I can, but I shouldn't, from a "needing to make money to survive" perspective. So. Not sure how I will proceed with those, but I'm making them. Everything feels pointless. Again, that's just where I'm at.

The Front Page (1931)

Oh, were hanging out with a bunch'a gossipy reporters waiting for news on an execution.

[classicmoviesarch]

The Front Page (1931) / Comedy Drama Film / Adolphe Menjou, Pat O'Brien, Mary Brian