“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 231

November 16th, 2020

I’ve got an eye doctor’s appointment today, so I’m being a little lazy again. I thought I’d dabble a bit in true crime.

This is an odd one, as it is from that Canadian program “The Fifth Estate”, but deals with a case in the United States: Dixon Illinois, to be exact, which is a little far south to be considered Southern Canada.

The town’s Comptroller, Rita Crundwell, embezzled an estimated $53 million between approximately 1990 and 2012 (when she was indicted). That seems to me to be an astonishing amount of money, especially for a town with a population of about 15,000. (That’s close to $2.5 million a year.)

And did she spend it on moving to a country without an extradition treaty? Nope. She spent it on…quarter horses. Supposedly, she became one of the leading quarter horse breeders in the US: at least, until she was indicted, tried, and sentenced to 19 1/2 years in prison.

I personally am kind of baffled by this: there’s nothing wrong with raising horses (though stealing money from taxpayers is objectionable) but if you’re going to do it, why not raise whole horses? Why raise just a quarter of a horse? What can you do with a quarter horse?

(Yes, I will be here all week.)

Bonus: True confession, I have not watched this yet, but “All the Queen’s Horses” is a longer documentary about Rita Crundwell and the Dixon fraud.

Posted in History, Horses, Law, Sarcasm | Comments Closed

Your loser update: week 10, 2020.

November 16th, 2020

NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:

New York Jets (bye week)

Next week: the worthless Los Angeles Chargers.

Posted in Loser, NFL, Sports | Comments Closed

“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 230

November 15th, 2020

Science Sunday!

I thought I’d do a variety package today.

First up: from the ” Megaprojects” people, “Project HARP”. Yet another thing that fascinates me, and only in part because who doesn’t like the science of big cannons?

The other reason this fascinates me, of course, is: Gerald Bull.

Next: I’m kind of borderline about including these. The hosts are just on the ragged edge of annoying me. But: fire science is science, and this was actually filmed in Del Valle, near Austin.

From “The Slow-Mo Guys”, a backdraft in 4K and slow motion.

And: “How to avoid a Backdraft”.

Finally: I know this is long-ish and very talking head, but I’ve read a couple of Paul De Kruff’s books, so this is relevant to my interests. Also: medical science is science, even if medicine is magical and magical is art.

“Paul De Kruif: The Microbe Hunter and Author”.

Posted in Books, Geek | Comments Closed

“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 229

November 14th, 2020

Wrapping up this week’s theme, I promise. Tomorrow will be Science Sunday, and after that, I plan to strive for a little more variety.

Since it is Saturday, I don’t feel so bad about doing something a little on the long side: “How The Dambusters Sunk Hitler’s Invincible Battleship”.

Also, as I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, I’m a big fan of the Dambusters and of Barnes Wallis. And speaking of Barnes Wallis, the Barnes Wallis Foundation has a YouTube channel.

So your bonus video for today is: “Dambusters Revealed”.

And your second bonus video for today is much shorter, but from the same source: vintage test footage of Barnes Wallis’s bombs.

Posted in History, Ships | Comments Closed

Obit watch: November 13, 2020.

November 13th, 2020

Paul Hornung.

Hornung, who won the 1956 Heisman Trophy with Notre Dame, could run, throw passes and catch them, block, place-kick and punt, and he returned kicks and played defense too. In nine professional seasons he helped propel the Packers to four National Football League championships and led the N.F.L. in scoring from 1959 to 1961.

…

Hornung scored a record 176 points in the 12-game 1960 season on 15 touchdowns, 41 extra points and 15 field goals. He also passed for two touchdowns that year.Hornung was the league’s most valuable player in 1961, when he scored a championship-game record 19 points (on a rushing touchdown, four extra points and three field goals) in the Packers’ 37-0 victory over the Giants.
All the while he pursued a robust night life of women and drink that seemed to have little effect on his on-field performance. His movie-star looks certainly had something to do with the attention: He was blond and handsome, 6 feet 2 inches and 215 pounds. He wore No. 5 in honor of his boyhood idol, Joe DiMaggio.
But Hornung’s career was marred when the N.F.L. commissioner, Pete Rozelle, suspended him indefinitely in the spring of 1963 for gambling on pro football, including Packer games, over several seasons. Hornung said he had bet on Green Bay only to win, and the league found no evidence to the contrary, but he remained suspended for the entire season. The ban was an outgrowth of an N.F.L. drive against gambling by players that also brought a one-year suspension for Alex Karras, the Detroit Lions’ star defensive tackle.

…

Hornung expressed few regrets about his nightlife.
“I’m sure that during my playing days I wasn’t considered a good role model for the nation’s youth,” he wrote in his memoir. “But the way times have changed, I’d look like an altar boy if I played today. I never beat up a woman, carried a gun or a knife, shot somebody, or got arrested for disturbing the peace. I never even experimented with drugs during the season.
“All I did, really,” he went on, “was seek out fun wherever I could find it. Everything was all tied in together — the drinking, the womanizing, the partying, the traveling, the gambling. And, of course, football made it all possible.”

In other totally unrelated news, Hell is having a busy day today:

Tom Metzger, white supremacist.

Peter Sutcliffe, the “Yorkshire Ripper”.

He was convicted in 1981 in the murders of 13 women over the course of five years in northern England and given a life sentence for each, the maximum permitted. The murders, which occurred between 1975 and 1980, gripped the public and the authorities, and the lengthy investigation was “a source of considerable embarrassment to the police,” The New York Times wrote at the time.

…

A 1981 report into the police investigation’s failings was released under the Freedom of Information Act in 2006. Known as the Byford report, for the official who wrote it, it cited a “curious and unexplained lull” in Mr. Sutcliffe’s criminal activities between 1969 and 1975. The report concluded that it was “highly improbable that the crimes in respect of which Sutcliffe has been charged and convicted are the only ones attributable to him.”

…

Sutcliffe’s 13 known murder victims were Wilma McCann (1975), Emily Jackson (1976), Irene Richardson (1977), Patricia “Tina” Atkinson (1977), Jayne MacDonald (1977), Jean Jordan (1977), Yvonne Pearson (1978), Helen Rytka (1978), Vera Millward (1978), Josephine Whitaker (1979), Barbara Leach (1979), Marguerite Walls (1980) and Jacqueline Hill (1980).
He is also known to have attacked at least 9 other women: an unnamed woman (1969), Anna Rogulskyj (1975), Olive Smelt (1975), Tracy Browne (1975), Marcella Claxton (1976), Marilyn Moore (1977), Upadhya Bandara (1980), Maureen Lea (1980) and Theresa Sykes (1980). Claxton was four months pregnant when she was attacked, and lost the baby she was carrying.

Posted in History, Law, NFL, Sports | Comments Closed

“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 228

November 13th, 2020

I thought I’d take a break from WWI today and go back to something slighlty more contemporary.

I know some folks who are fans of the F-8 Crusader. I never quite acquired that gene myself, but this is a kind of fun (and short) documentary about the F-8 from “Dark Skies”: “The Last Gunfighter”.

Bonus #1: I don’t know where this came from (other than the “AVHistoryBuff” channel) but here’s a second, shorter documentary: “Chance Vought’s F-8 Crusader II and III – the Mig Masters”. It seems very professionally done, like a corporate promotional video.

Bonus #2: Here’s a vintage US Navy training film on the F8U-1P, the photo recon version of the F-8.

Bonus #3: And for those of you who haven’t had enough Crusader yet, “Last of the Gunfighters”. This one’s a bit longer.

Posted in History, Planes | Comments Closed

“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 227

November 12th, 2020

Travel Thursday!

If you’ve figured out what my theme this week is, you’re probably wondering: how do military history and military heroism fit in with travel?

Answer: This is an episode of a documentary series called “True Adventure”, which according to the YouTube notes, ran in the 1950s and 1960s.

This episode is “Return to Guadalcanal”. One of the men in this video, Martin Clemens, was on Guadalcanal when Japan invaded: instead of evacuating, he stayed behind and became a coast watcher. He later wrote a book, Alone on Guadalcanal: A Coastwatcher’s Story (which is available in reprint and Kindle editions from Amazon).

Bonus: from the Kadena Air Base channel, members of the 18th Wing tour Iwo Jima.

Posted in History, Travel | Comments Closed

“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 226

November 11th, 2020

It seems like there are a lot of WWI aviation documentaries on the ‘Tube. This is one aspect of the war that I have found fascinating for a long time: wooden planes and iron men.

Unfortunately, pretty much all of them I’ve found so far are long. Like, multiple parts with each part about 90 minutes long. If you’ve got the time and inclination, you might look for “4 Years of Thunder” or “Flying Coffins“. I have not watched these myself yet.

Here’s one I found, “Cavalry Of The Clouds” that is a little on the long side, but not quite as long.

Bonus #1: From “The Great War” channel, a special, “Sharpshooters and Snipers in World War 1”.

Bonus #2: I’m pulling this somewhat out of context, as it is part of the “Over There” series from the NRAPubs channel, but I think it stands alone: the story of Alvin C. York, Medal of Honor recipient.

Upon returning to his unit, York reported to his brigade commander, Brigadier General Julian Robert Lindsey, who remarked: “Well York, I hear you have captured the whole German army.” York replied: “No sir. I got only 132.”

Posted in Guns, History, Planes | Comments Closed

Father Charles Joseph Watters.

November 11th, 2020

Father Watters was born in 1927 and ordained in 1953. He served in various parishes around New Jersey.

He was also a licensed private pilot. In 1962, he joined the New Jersey Air National Guard as a chaplain. In 1964, he went full time with the US Army, and started his first tour of duty in Vietnam in July of 1966. During this tour, he was awarded the Air Medal and a Bronze Star for Valor.

Armed only with his camera, Fr. Watters didn’t hesitate to jump into a violent battlefield with the “Herd,” as the 173rd was sometimes called. When his unit was rotated to the rear for rest, he would stay in the field with the troops still facing imminent danger. Fr. Watters truly believed his duty was to remain alongside the soldiers doing the fighting. He would tend to both their physical and emotional needs by saying Mass, joking with them, providing spiritual comfort and tending to grievous wounds. The word quickly spread about the dedicated priest in the 173rd who routinely risked his life for his men. He sealed his legendary status on February 22, 1967, when he joined 845 fellow paratroopers in their jump during Operation Junction City, the largest such airborne assault of the war to that date, and the only major combat jump of the entire war.

At the end of this first tour (July of 1967), he volunteered for a six-month extension, “simply stating, ‘His boys needed him.’”

On November 19, 1967, his unit became involved in the battle of Dak To.

Chaplain Watters was moving with one of the companies when it engaged a heavily armed enemy battalion. As the battle raged and the casualties mounted, Chaplain Watters, with complete disregard for his safety, rushed forward to the line of contact. Unarmed and completely exposed, he moved among, as well as in front of the advancing troops, giving aid to the wounded, assisting in their evacuation, giving words of encouragement, and administering the last rites to the dying. When a wounded paratrooper was standing in shock in front of the assaulting forces, Chaplain Watters ran forward, picked the man up on his shoulders and carried him to safety. As the troopers battled to the first enemy entrenchment, Chaplain Watters ran through the intense enemy fire to the front of the entrenchment to aid a fallen comrade. A short time later, the paratroopers pulled back in preparation for a second assault. Chaplain Watters exposed himself to both friendly and enemy fire between the 2 forces in order to recover 2 wounded soldiers. Later, when the battalion was forced to pull back into a perimeter, Chaplain Watters noticed that several wounded soldiers were Lying outside the newly formed perimeter. Without hesitation and ignoring attempts to restrain him, Chaplain Watters left the perimeter three times in the face of small arms, automatic weapons, and mortar fire to carry and to assist the injured troopers to safety. Satisfied that all of the wounded were inside the perimeter, he began aiding the medics–applying field bandages to open wounds, obtaining and serving food and water, giving spiritual and mental strength and comfort. During his ministering, he moved out to the perimeter from position to position redistributing food and water, and tending to the needs of his men. Chaplain Watters was giving aid to the wounded when he himself was mortally wounded.

Father Watters was with the 503rd Infantry, 2nd Battalion, Charlie Company, as they started the ascent to take Hill 875. He was given the option to stay behind, as many chaplains would do. He chose to stay with his boys, as he usually did when combat was likely. They would follow one of the steep ridges the area was known for. Delta Company to the left, Charlie on the right, Alpha Company would bring up the rear. Delta and Charlie companies quickly came under intense fire from what seemed to be invisible soldiers attacking from expertly camouflaged bunkers. By 3:00 p.m., Charlie Company was completely surrounded by 200-300 NVA regulars, with mortar rounds, automatic weapons fire and B-40 rockets continuously raining down on them. Throughout the day, Watters repeatedly risked his life to retrieve injured soldiers, even though it always meant leaving the relative safety of his own company’s perimeter. In one documented incident, a wounded paratrooper suffering from shock was standing in front of assaulting forces. Chaplain Watters ran forward without hesitation, ignoring numerous attempts to restrain him, picked up the man on his shoulders and carried him to safety. Futile attempts to resupply the company in this inaccessible area saw six helicopters shot down. Desperate calls for airstrikes were made as the sun set. One 500 lb. bomb dropped by a U.S. Marine fighter-bomber just arriving on station struck only 50 meters from Charlie Company, killing 25 NVA troops preparing for a night attack. Tragically, however, another 500 lb. bomb from the same aircraft struck the company’s command post and aid station. Some 42 Americans, many of them wounded already, were killed and 45 more were wounded in the war’s worst “friendly fire” incident. According to a survivor’s account, Fr. Watters was on his knees giving last rites to a dying paratrooper when the errant bomb hit, killing him instantly.

He was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously.

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“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 225

November 10th, 2020

Sticking with our theme, I thought I’d do some WWI history for reasons. WWI really isn’t a war that I’ve been all that interested in until fairly recently, having seen “They Shall Not Grow Old” and read A Rifleman Went To War (affiliate link to the Kindle edition. 99 cents? Really? How can you pass that up?).

“The Battle of the Somme” from something called “Epic History TV”.

And as a bonus: “The Battle Of Passchendaele” from the ” Timeline – World History Documentaries” folks.

Posted in History | Comments Closed

Your loser update: week 9, 2020.

November 10th, 2020

NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:

New York Jets

Next week is the Jets bye week. Vegas has the bye as a 14 point favorite over the Jets.

Posted in Loser, NFL, Sports | Comments Closed

“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 224

November 9th, 2020

I’m thinking there’s a theme I want to work with this week.

From the “Dark Docs” channel, “Alive and Free – Or Dead”, a short documentary about Dieter Dengler.

He was one of two survivors, the other being Phisit Intharathat, out of seven prisoners of war (POWs) who escaped from a Pathet Lao prison camp in Laos. He was rescued after 23 days on the run following six months of torture and imprisonment and was the first captured U.S. airman to escape enemy captivity during the Vietnam war.

Lawrence and I have a fair amount of Herzog on our giant movie list, including “Little Dieter Needs To Fly”. I did not know this until today, but there’s a huge Herzog blu-ray box set (affiliate link) from Shout Factory that tempts me greatly.

Bonus: from the “Wings Over Vietnam” series, “The Jolly Greens”, about the guys who rescued pilots who were downed over Vietnam.

Posted in History, Movies | 2 Comments »

Obit watch: November 9, 2020.

November 9th, 2020

A few obits from over the weekend. I’ll start by just quoting the lead from this NYT one:

Norm Crosby, the comedian known as the master of malaprop because he spoke from his diagram and related many funny antidotes, often to a standing ovulation, died on Saturday in Los Angeles. He was 93.

More:

He was trying to develop new material when a club owner made an offhand comment about one of the club’s cabaret dancers. The owner, who had given the young woman a ride, “came into my dressing room and he said to me, ‘Find out if the girl is staying over or if she communicates,’” Mr. Crosby recalled. “I said, ‘My God, a lot of people talk like that. Maybe that would be fun.’ So I started the play on words.”
He tried it in Massachusetts, he added, “and the places I worked, unfortunately, people didn’t get the difference.”
Because of the particulars of his Latin Quarter booking, Mr. Crosby’s routine was not an immediate breakthrough with Times Square audiences either. He started out performing 12-minute filler sets between stage acts during his weeklong engagement, and his jokes were largely ignored. “I was on for five minutes before anybody knew I was out there,” he said.
At the end of the week, a dejected Mr. Crosby packed his bags and went to pick up his check from the manager, who apologized for the difficult assignment and promised him a better slot in the show. Once audiences had a chance to get the joke, he was a hit. He stayed at the Latin Quarter for 18 weeks, after which the prestigious William Morris Agency began representing him.

…

Speaking of Senator Goldwater, he said, “When President Johnson declared war on puberty, it was Senator Goldwater who said, and I quote, ‘Wherever there is unemployment, you’ll find men out of work.’”
He was a pitchman in the late 1970s and early 1980s for Anheuser-Busch’s Natural Light beer, appearing in commercials with Mickey Mantle, Henny Youngman and Joe Frazier.
In one commercial, he declared, “I always keep Natural on hand while I watch these athletes perspiring to achieve victory, cause these sporting computations make me so dehybernated.”

Robert Sam Anson, noted magazine writer and author.

Marguerite Littman.

By all accounts hypnotically charming, Ms. Littman, who landed in Los Angeles at midcentury, counted among her closest friends the writer Christopher Isherwood and his partner, the artist Don Bachardy, as well as Gore Vidal, David Hockney and, famously, Truman Capote, who is said to have distilled that charm into his most famous character, Holly Golightly of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.”

…

An oft-told story about Ms. Littman goes like this: Mr. Capote and Ms. Littman were sitting at the pool at Cipriani’s in Venice in the late 1970s when Ms. Littman pointed out an extremely thin woman. “That is anorexia nervosa,” she declared. And Mr. Capote replied, “Oh Marguerite, you know everybody.”

Finally, Eddie Johnson. My feelings about the NBA are well known, but this is a depressing story.

Johnson, who was nicknamed Fast Eddie for his explosive first step, was drafted out of Auburn University in 1977 by the Atlanta Hawks. He soon became one of the team’s top players and started the 1980 and 1981 All-Star Games.
“He was built like a linebacker and was as fast as they come with the ball in his hands, putting it on the floor, attacking someone off the dribble,” Mike Fratello, who coached the Hawks during some of Johnson’s nine seasons with the team, said in a phone interview. “And he could defend because of his strength and his ability to move his feet.”

But he also got into cocaine.

Johnson began to use cocaine in college and continued using it during his N.B.A. career. During his professional playing days, he was charged with cocaine possession, writing bad checks and car theft; he was hospitalized at least twice for treatment of manic-depressive disorder; and he successfully fled two men shooting at him in a motel parking lot after what the police said was a drug deal gone wrong.
In 1981, Johnson discussed his cocaine use in an interview with Sports Illustrated. “I partied a little extensively, but I wasn’t abusing it,” he said. “The whole idea of me abusing drugs is outlandish.”

He was traded to Cleveland, went to Seattle briefly, and was banned by the NBA in 1987.

When there were no games left to play, Johnson’s life unraveled. By his own count, he was arrested at least 100 times. Between 1987 and 2001, he was convicted, among other crimes, of burglary, battery, drug sale and possession, violently resisting arrest and grand theft.
He committed his most serious crime in 2006. Prosecutors said he had entered the unlocked front door of an apartment in Ocala where an 8-year-old girl and her three brothers were alone watching television; a babysitter had stepped outside.
The girl testified at Johnson’s trial in 2008 that he had followed her to her bedroom, locked the door and pushed a dresser in front of it before sexually assaulting her. He was convicted of sexual battery and molestation. He received a mandatory life sentence.

Posted in Obits, Sports | Comments Closed

Obit watch: November 8, 2020.

November 8th, 2020

Alex Trebek. Jeopardy. Variety. THR.

The Lustgarten Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research.

Alex is survived by his wife of 30 years, Jean, and children Matthew, Emily, and Nicky. The family has announced no plans for a service, but gifts in Alex’s memory could go to World Vision.

Posted in Obits, TV | Comments Closed

“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 223

November 8th, 2020

Science Sunday!

This is an interesting intersection of two things I’m interested in: space history and photography.

“How did NASA get those great film shots of Apollo and the Shuttle?”

Bonus: I’ve touched on Harold “Doc” Edgerton previously, but this is a nice tribute and explanation of his work from MIT.

Bonus #2: “Quicker ‘n a Wink”, Doc in 1940.

I’m not going to include them here, but if you search YouTube, you can find some videos that emulate Dr. Edgerton’s photos with modern equipment.

My reason for not including them here is that they do require purchasing some equipment that you probably do not already have: while the price for the additional equipment in one video is reasonable (slightly more than $50) I don’t want to be seen as endorsing the products.

(And I realize that may seem kind of hypocritical for someone who throws around Amazon affiliate links like candy. What can I say: man’s got to have some standards, even if they are low ones.)

Posted in Geek, History, Photography | Comments Closed

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