Pop Culture Institute

Pop History Moment: MILK, MOSCONE SLAIN

2009-11-27T00:10:00.000-08:00

On this day in 1978 Dan White - an emotionally unstable and homophobic ex-cop, who'd been gunning for the openly-gay Harvey Milk for years - calmly walked into Milk's office in San Francisco City Hall and finally got him, gunning him down in cold blood; by then he'd already been to the office of Mayor George Moscone, shot and killed him, and reloaded - all without being detected...

Having spent several days planning the killings - in which spree he'd also hoped to include Carol Ruth Silver (an outspoken liberal on the city's Board of Supervisors) as well as Willie Brown - White sneaked into City Hall through a basement window to avoid the metal detectors (even going so far as planning to bring extra ammunition with him) then apparently set about his task in a very business-like manner.

At the root of White's ire was the fact that he'd previously resigned his seat on the Board of Supervisors in a fit of pique, then regretted it almost instantly. Moscone hadn't regretted accepting it, though; in fact, he'd already chosen a successor, Don Horanzy. White had long been a thorn in Moscone's side, often voting against progressive initiatives simply out of partisan bias, and the Mayor was said to be glad to get rid of such an obstreperous and divisive individual so easily.

When Dan White later turned himself in to the police (intentionally at the same precinct house where he'd once worked) he denied having acted with premeditation, which lie his old buddies were only too happy to believe. The courts too - which, rather than sentencing him to first-degree murder, charged him instead with voluntary manslaughter due to diminished capacity, citing the rightfully notorious Twinkie defense. Outrage over its use in this instance led to the State of California's outlawing of the diminished capacity defense, in much the same way the Matthew Shepard case led to a widespread banning of the so-called 'homosexual panic defense' a generation later.

Owing to the most specious defense in legal history, when White's slap on the wrist verdict was handed down in May 1979 - the day before what would have been Harvey Milk's 49th birthday - rioting by a mostly gay male mob erupted in San Francisco's Civic Center: windows were smashed in City Hall, parking meters uprooted, and police cars torched. Known as the White Night Riots, they represent the most significant demonstration of outrage ever committed by a gay community, possibly even greater than the Stonewall Riots themselves*; supporters of California's Proposition H8 should consider themselves grateful that we as a community have done some considerable evolution in the three decades since then...

Dan White was paroled in 1984, no doubt having come to terms with what was a fatal ambivalence to butt sex after spending five years of a seven-year stretch at Soledad State Prison; he committed suicide less than two years after his release. While that outcome might have startled White's imaginary nemesis, Milk had been calmly resigned to his own fate; prior to his death, he recorded a will in which he posited that his own death would likely be at the hands of 'somebody who is insecure, terrified, afraid, or very disturbed themselves' - as good a description of Dan White as has ever been made.

Not only are the events of this terrible day recorded in Randy Shilts' must-read memoir The Mayor of Castro Street - reporting which formed the basis for the documentary The Times of Harvey Milk - they're as central to Armistead Maupin's 1982 novel Further Tales of the City and the miniseries spawned by it as they are to Gus Van Sant's instant classic Oscar-bait biopic Milk, in which Harvey Milk is played by Sean Penn and Dan White by Josh Brolin.

*A controversial statement, to be true, but given the massive increase in gay-themed stories being covered in the mainstream media between June 1969 and May 1979, the White Night Riots generated far more attention at the time they occurred than their Manhattan counterparts had, even though the event in San Francisco never would have been possible without the legacy of Stonewall.
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Now Showing - "Bill Nye: Speedwalker"

2009-11-27T00:05:00.000-08:00

Birthday wishes go out today to Bill Nye ('The Science Guy') - the former Boeing engineer whose first television exposure was as a cast member on Seattle's iconic late-night sketch show Almost Live!, which he then parlayed into a career as Bill Nye the Science Guy on PBS.

Nye is seen here assaying his most famous early role - that of Speedwalker, who in this exciting episode is racing to save the Kingdome from destruction by a madman (ably played by the voice of John Keister and Bob Nelson)... Of course, Speedwalker's saving of the Kindome was only temporary; the 25-year-old facility was destroyed by a controlled implosion in March 2000, and has been replaced by Qwest Field on the same site.
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POPnews - November 27th

2009-11-27T00:01:00.000-08:00

[Helen Clark and her Labour Party formed three successive governments in New Zealand, serving until defeated at the General Election of November 2008 by John Key's centre-right National Party.]
1095 - Pope Urban II declared the First Crusade at the Council of Clermont.

1295 - The so-called Model Parliament called by King Edward I assembled at Westminster; although Parliament had met semi-regularly more than fifty times since Henry III held the Parliament of Merton at Merton Priory in 1236, the Model Parliament marks the beginning of the involvement of the Commons in that august body.

1703 - The first Eddystone Lighthouse was destroyed by the Great Storm of 1703.

1815 - The Constitution of the Kingdom of Poland was adopted; it was then signed by Russia's Tsar Alexander I under the terms of the Congress of Vienna.

1839 - The American Statistical Association was founded in Boston.

1901 - The US Army War College was established, at Pennsylvania's Carlisle Barracks.

1924 - The first Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade was held in New York City.

1934 - Notorious bank robber and Public Enemy Number One Baby Face Nelson died in a gun battle, which also resulted in the deaths of FBI agents Herman Hollis and Samuel P. Cowley.

1940 - In Romania the ruling party's Iron Guard arrested and executed over 60 of exiled King Carol II's aides, including former minister Nicolae Iorga.

1942 - The French Navy scuttled its ships and submarines moored at Toulon to keep them out of Nazi hands.

1971 - The Soviet-built Mars 2 probe landed on Mars.

1973 - The United States Senate voted 92 to 3 to confirm Gerald Ford as Vice President of the United States according to protocols set out by the Twenty-fifth Amendment; the House of Representatives confirmed him 387 to 35 on December 6th. Ford was appointed to replace disgraced outgoing Vice President Spiro Agnew.

1975 - The Provisional IRA assassinated Ross McWhirter, after a press conference at which McWhirter had announced a reward for the capture of those responsible for multiple bombings and shootings across England.

1978 - Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk of San Francisco were assassinated by former Supervisor Dan White.

1990 - John Major was chosen leader of Britain's Conservative Party after the ouster of former leader and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

1999 - Helen Clark became the first female Prime Minister of New Zealand as leader of that country's left-leaning Labour Party.

2001 - A hydrogen atmosphere was discovered on the planet Osiris by the Hubble Space Telescope, the first such conditions detected on an exoplanet.

2004 - Pope John Paul II returned the relics of Saint John Chrysostom to the Eastern Orthodox Church.

2005 - The first partial human face transplant was performed - on Isabelle Dinoire by Jean-Michel Dubernard in the French city of Amiens.
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Happy American Thanksgiving

2009-11-26T00:40:00.000-08:00

Entitled Freedom from Want - and itself one of Norman Rockwell's Four Freedoms paintings, which were inspired by US President Franklin D. Roosevelt's State of the Union address of January 1941, also known as Four Freedoms - this iconic image was first published in The Saturday Evening Post in March 1943.

Over the years this famous feast has been extensively parodied, and yet each satirical rendering has only served to strengthen the sentiments it embodies; it's offered here, first and foremost, to my American readers, in the hopes that the abundance it depicts will accrue to you and yours in the coming year.
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Now Showing: "A Boy Named Charlie Brown"

2009-11-26T00:35:00.000-08:00

Although I have been scoffed at for saying it in the past, the deeper my research into the Peanuts canon delves the more true it seems... Anyone wishing to know what kind of man Charlie Brown might have grown into need look no further than me for the answer.

The film from which this clip is derived - A Boy Named Charlie Brown - was released December 4th, 1969, six days after I was born; I'm sure I never saw it as a child, so it's message - a particularly harsh although eventually redemptive one for the boy in the title - couldn't have influenced my own view of myself, let alone reinforced the theory I iterated in the previous paragraph.

Yet I cannot watch this without seeing my life in it: the trying, the failing, the persisting... There are even glimpses in my life today of the potential success experienced by the Peanuts gang accruing to me as well. Fortunately I am not as physically alike Charlie Brown as I am spiritually, so I will be able to keep my fingers crossed!
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In Memoriam: Charles M. Schulz

2009-11-26T00:30:00.000-08:00

Charles M. Schulz was more than a cartoonist, he was a humanitarian; turning his own childhood hurts into humour, he helped the generations of kids who grew up reading his Peanuts strips to know that they were not alone in their angst, utilizing the unique power of the mass media to do it.

Yet what he leaves out of is work is just as telling as what he includes; the adult presence in the strips is both minimal and incomprehensible*, and the limited time the gang spends in school is occasional at best and fraught with emotional peril besides. The message imparted by this is that the important lessons learned by kids are in their extra-curricular interactions with each other, be they at the baseball diamond or just in hanging out together. Whether or not I agree with this is neither here nor there, as clearly it was a reflection of the cartoonist's own experience.

Charles Schulz - Sparky, to his friends - was born on this day in 1922, and in the course of his career hand-drew every frame through fifty years' worth of strips by himself, finishing the last just prior to his death in February 2000. Owing to his considerable business savvy, he made the characters he created into television and movie stars, toys and t-shirts and everything else, as well as commercial shills - creating in them a venerable brand which has easily outlived him; thanks to them (and the revenue they still generate) he was able to turn his home in Santa Rosa, California, into the Charles Schulz Museum, which is now a place of pilgrimage for Peanuts fans the world over.

The entire run of Peanuts is being republished, two years at a time with a new book published every six months for twelve-and-a-half years, by Fantagraphics; the twelve volumes published so far, covering the years 1950-1974 have earned pride of place in the collection of the Pop Culture Institute, and look forward to being joined by their brethren in the fullness of time.

*WAA-waa waa waa, waa-WAA waa-waa waa!
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Remembering... Joey Stefano

2009-11-26T00:25:00.000-08:00

Inasmuch as I love porn, I am also the first to accept that its corrosive aspect - plus the veritable bombardment of negative messages it contains* - are as apt to poison its participants, be they creator or consumer, as not. That said, I still love it, and credit porn with preventing any number of disasters, as it has been the only sexual outlet available to me for vast periods of my teenage and adult life.

One of the models whose body of work best expresses this dichotomy is Joey Stefano; not only is he the quintessential fantasy figure**, off camera his life wasn't at all improved by affiliating with an industry notoriously callous towards those it makes large profits to exploit.

Born on the first day of 1968 in Chester, Pennsylvania, Joey Stefano drifted to New York at the age of fifteen following the death of his father. Supporting himself by prostitution and its related endeavours (namely stripping, which he did at Manhattan's notorious gay burlesque house, the Show Theater) it was there he met gay porn icon Tony Davis, who convinced him to de-camp to Los Angeles and hook up with a then-emerging porn auteur named Chi Chi LaRue; together they would make such gay porn classics as More of a Man and My Cousin Danny.

For awhile Stefano was living the high life... If only his meteoric rise to porn idol hadn't been compounded with an existing drug problem and a self-destructive streak he might have survived it. As it is, the pinnacle of his career came in 1992 when Madonna*** cast him in her 'bend me over the' coffee table book Sex.

Joey Stefano died on this day in 1994; although he was HIV-positive at the time, his body contained elevated amounts of four different drugs, any one of which could have killed him. His story is elegantly told in Charles Isherwood's book Wonder Bread and Ecstasy: The Life and Death of Joey Stefano. Or, to hear about his life in his own words, click here...

*To be fair, though, depending on your perspective those negative messages may merely be read into the medium, rather than inherent in it.
** The unprecedented intimacy which porn promises - and the access it offers to super hot guys, the kind who wouldn't give me time of day in real life - is largely to blame for why I love it so much in the first place.
***Herself no stranger to the gay male psyche.
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"Proud Mary" by Ike and Tina Turner

2009-11-26T00:20:00.000-08:00

Birthday wishes go out to Tina Turner, shown here performing Proud Mary early in her career alongside her then-husband Ike Turner with the Ike & Tina Turner Revue.

Tina Turner's career, of course, took off in 1984 with the release of her album Private Dancer, but as the video shows would have been legendary without it, based on the power of performances like this.
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"Ain't I A Woman?" by Sojourner Truth

2009-11-26T00:15:00.000-08:00

In 1851 a freed slave named Sojourner Truth addressed the Ohio Women's Rights Convention... At the time many of those involved in the cause of female suffrage were unwilling or unable to see that the disenfranchised and oppressed stood a far greater chance at liberty by standing together than apart. Entitled Ain't I a Woman?, the truth spoken by Sojourner Truth on that day - and recorded for posterity by Frances Gage - speaks to us still...

Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter. I think that 'twixt the negroes of the South and the women at the North, all talking about rights, the white men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what's all this here talking about?

That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?

Then they talk about this thing in the head; what's this they call it? [member of audience whispers, "intellect"] That's it, honey. What's that got to do with women's rights or negroes' rights? If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart, wouldn't you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full?

Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wasn't a woman! Where did your Christ come from? Where did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.

If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, these women together ought to be able to turn it back , and get it right side up again! And now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.

Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain't got nothing more to say.
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Sojourner Truth: As Strong As Any Man That Is Now

2009-11-26T00:10:00.000-08:00

Whenever I find myself dealing with job dissatisfaction*, I find it helps to consider the plight of slaves... So while its true that slavery to my lifestyle** keeps me coming back for more like the masochist I am, at least I'm able to take my job and shove it without my job shoving back.

Born a slave in Upstate New York in 1797 with the name Isabella Baumfree, the life of the woman who came to be known as Sojourner Truth ran the usual gamut that attends the life of a slave; when she was bought and sold, repeatedly raped and beaten, denied the man she loved, and had her children taken from her and sold, it was all just another day at work for her.

New York State began the process of emancipation in 1799, a process that would not be complete until 1827; promised her freedom in 1826 by her Master, John Dumont, he reneged on the deal, at which time she escaped. She was taken in by a Quaker couple, Isaac and Maria Van Wagenen, who bought her services and allowed her to live with them until such time as she could go free. While living with them she underwent a religious conversion which would shape the rest of her life.

In 1851 Sojourner Truth made her famous oration at a convention of the Ohio Women's Rights Convention; entitled Ain't I a Woman?, it excoriated the phony chivalry of southern men, whose concern for women was entirely for pretty, young white women. She is also credited with writing the song, The Valiant Soldiers, popular during the Civil War.

Sojourner Truth died on this day in 1883, surrounded by some of the family she was able to reclaim, her words and the works she'd seen to in the last half of her life having assured that the plight of all those in search of equal rights stood a better chance at improvement when those seeking them stood together, rather than apart...

*Just about every waking minute of every day I'm not writing.
**A tiny apartment, a lousy diet, and more books that Carrie Bradshaw has shoes...
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Madame: Our Woman Of The Year

2009-11-26T00:05:00.000-08:00

Wayland Flowers - responsible for the flamboyant puppet creation Madame - was born on this day in 1939; between the mid-1960s and his death in October 1988 she was the holy terror of the nightclub circuit, dispensing wit and witticism with a decidedly acerbic sting. This clip comes from the relatively anodyne sitcom Madame's Place, in which Madame is being honoured with a roast. Given that among the roasters is Judy Landers, don't expect anything with the zing of Dean Martin's Man of the Hour.

Recently, comedian Rick Skye has begun performing Madame again, at Resorts Atlantic City - a development heartily endorsed by the Pop Culture Institute; given the popularity of this post since it first appeared in 2008 it's clearly also favoured by our readership as well!
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In Memoriam: Joe DiMaggio

2009-11-25T00:30:00.000-08:00

Born on this day in 1914, the eighth of nine children, when Joe DiMaggio was a year old the entire brood moved to San Francisco and, even more than New York, it was thereafter the city most often associated with him; following his retirement he opened a successful restaurant in the city's North Beach neighbourhood, and became known for his quiet good works in children's athletics.

In his entire illustrious career - thirteen seasons in all from 1936 to 1951 (save for a 31-month stint in the USAF starting in February 1943) - Joe DiMaggio wore no uniform other than that of the New York Yankees, and no number but #5 would suit the man they called the Yankee Clipper. The three-time MVP and 13-time All Star won nine World Series victories in his 13 seasons, and in 1941 embarked on a legendary 56-game hitting streak which earned him another sobriquet: Joltin' Joe. Yankee Stadium may have been 'The House That Ruth Built', but it was Joe DiMaggio who paid the mortgage.

Whatever fame his years in baseball accrued to him, his retirement wasn't exactly spent out of the limelight. A surprise 274-day marriage to the up-and-coming starlet Marilyn Monroe in January 1954, for instance, or his election to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1955, seemed to occur in spite of his desire for privacy, and seemingly without his encouragement either, as he was notoriously reticent, especially with the press.

Despite the shortness of their marriage, DiMaggio remained devoted to Marilyn for the rest of his life (which came to a close in March 1999); following their divorce he never remarried, although he was often seen squiring lovely ladies around. Rumours circulated at the time of her death in August 1962 that he was trying to get her to marry him again, but it never came to pass.

After her death he was the only one of the men with whom she was involved who didn't try to capitalize on their relationship by writing some kind of tell-all book; indeed, Arthur Miller wrote a whole play about their life together while DiMaggio never so much as gave an interview. Nevertheless, he's the one who made her funeral arrangements, and had six red roses delivered to her final resting place 3 times a week for 20 years.
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Pop History Moment: Band Aid Recorded "Do They Know It's Christmas"

2009-11-25T00:25:00.000-08:00

Now, under normal circumstances, I'm something of a hard-ass about displays of Christmas before my birthday*; having been raised by the Queen of Christmas herself, if I didn't put my foot down as a child, those few birthday parties I did have would have all been Santa-themed and awash in tinsel. But even I am capable of reason - a revelation which may come as something of a surprise to my regular readers - so I've decided to make an exception in this case, since this particular Christmas morsel is especially suitable for blogging... ~ MSM

On this day in 1984 the cream of Britain's music industry traveled to Midge Ure's home recording studio in London's Notting Hill at the behest of Bob Geldof to record a song called Do They Know It's Christmas? under the musical rubric of Band Aid. With just 24 hours to do it in, Ure and Geldof (with Nigel Dick behind the camera) recorded (and recorded the making of) the biggest charity record in history prior to Elton John's rewriting of his own song to assuage the public grief over the death of Diana, Princess of Wales just under a bakers' dozen years later.

For me the most interesting thing about this video, at least in pop cultural terms, is how many of the faces (or images, anyway) shown here continue to exert their pull over British music - or at least the tabloid headlines - to this day. While Kool & The Gang and Jody Watley were the only Americans present, those British and Irish performers included Freddie Mercury, Phil Collins, Paul Young, Simon Le Bon, Bono, George Michael, Sting, Paul Weller, and a badly jet-lagged Boy George; among those whose careers haven't gone so well since the 80s ended are the members of Spandau Ballet, Keren Woodward of Bananarama, Heaven 17's Martyn Ware, and Boy George's protege Marilyn.

*November 28th...
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Gratuitous Brunette: Jill Hennessy

2009-11-25T00:20:00.000-08:00

Canada's Jill Hennessy first came to my notice when she emerged through the revolving doors in the casting department at Law & Order; undoubtedly, though, there are those - such as the pervs who like to spank it to the work of Canadian filmmaker David Cronenberg - who will remember her and her sister Jacqueline for playing twin call girls in his 1988 gynecological S&M epic Dead Ringers.

So while she might have been a sensation as Dana Scully, on The X-Files (a role that, of course, went to Gillian Anderson) it was as ADA Claire Kincaid that American audiences came to know her, and it was as Jordan Cavanaugh on Crossing Jordan that they came to know her even better still.

Following a high profile role as First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy in the TV-movie Jackie, Ethel, Joan: The Women of Camelot*, something tells me we haven't heard the last of Jill Hennessy; if anyone can pull a third act out of her career she can. Not only has she been recording an album in Nashville - bolstered, no doubt, by the acclaim her barefooted onstage jam sessions with the Indigo Girls have earned her - but she recently directed an independent film about the lives and loves of a group of thespians called The Acting Class.

*Based on the book by famed celebrity biographer J. Randy Taraborrelli.
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Pop History Moment: The Death of Yukio Mishima

2009-11-25T00:15:00.000-08:00

The author of poetry, prose, and plays, Yukio Mishima's literary tendencies earned him abuse as a youth and acclaim as an adult; as respected as Mishima's works are for their philosophical mysticism, throughout the 1960s his hard-line nationalist views began to make even his admirers uneasy. More than his politics, though, it's the manner of his death that has cast a pall over his achievements as a master of Japanese post-war literature...

On this day in 1970 Mishima and four members of the private army he founded, Tatenokai, paid a visit to General Kanetoshi Mashita, the commandant of the Ichigaya Camp, which is the Tokyo headquarters of the Eastern Command of the Japan Self-Defense Forces; after seizing control of the camp, Mishima tried to rally the assembled troops to undertake a coup d'etat in order to bring about the restoration of divinity to the Emperor, Hirohito, which had been stripped from him by the US as a condition of peace following World War II.

For his efforts, Mishima was jeered.

Returning to the commandant's office he committed seppuku - a form of ritual suicide specified as a face-saving alternative to capture by the bushido code of the Samurai, to which tenets Mishima had become obsessed - with the assistance of Masakatsu Morita (who was unable to complete the task) and Hiroyasu Koga (a kendo master who was not only able to finish off Mishima but Morita as well).

Mishima had secretly planned his suicide for at least a year, probably aware the whole time that post-war Japan would never again embrace such anachronisms as a divine emperor and the bushido code. His own twisted sexuality surely played a part, as did his disdain for Western influence upon Japanese society, in creating an unresolvable dichotomy between an idealized past and an unwillingness to accept change in the present. While many conservatives prefer to sadistically lash out at progressives over just such a conflict of their own making, Mishima was a masochist, and instead took his frustrations out on himself.

If there's a moral to this story, I can't quite bring myself to spell it out...
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Remembering... Flip Wilson

2009-11-25T00:10:00.000-08:00

Way way back in the day - when the only black folks regularly on TV were Diahann Carroll's Julia, Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Uhura, and Sammy Davis, Jr. on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In - there was also Flip Wilson, whose weekly variety show The Flip Wilson Show debuted in 1970; among the writing staff for the ground-breaking show was George Carlin, whose counter-cultural proclivities were then only just developing. Here we see Wilson in character as Geraldine, making the normally unflappable Muhammed Ali look more than a little nervous...

When Flip Wilson died on this day in 1998 the outpouring of grief surprised most observers; Wilson had been all but out of show business for the last two decades of his life by that time. However, those who knew him when were quick to eulogize their friend as a gentle soul whose great joy in life was entertaining people...
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"The White Ship: A Ballad" by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

2009-11-25T00:05:00.000-08:00

By none but me can the tale be told,
The butcher of Rouen, poor Berold.
(Lands are swayed by a King on a throne.)
'Twas a royal train put forth to sea,
Yet the tale can be told by none but me.
(The sea hath no King but God alone)

King Henry held it as life's whole gain
That after his death his son should reign.

'Twas so in my youth I heard men say,
And my old age calls it back today.

King Henry of England's realm was he,
And Henry Duke of Normandy.

The times had changed when on either coast
“Clerkly Harry” was all his boast.

Of ruthless strokes full many an one
He had struck to crown himself and his son;
And his elder brother's eyes were gone.

But all the chiefs of the English land
Had knelt and kissed the Prince's hand.

And next with his son he sailed to France
To claim the Norman allegiance:

And every baron in Normandy
Had taken the oath of fealty.

'Twas sworn and sealed, and the day had come
When the King & the Prince might journey home:

For Christmas cheer is to home hearts dear,
And Christmas now was drawing near.

Stout Fitz-Stephen came to the King;—
A pilot famous in sea-faring;

And he held to the King, in all men's sight,
A mark of gold for his tribute's right.

”Liege Lord! my father guided the ship
From whose boat your father's foot did slip
When he caught the English soil in his grip,

“And cried,” By this clasp I claim command
O'er every rood of English land!”

“He was borne to the realm you rule o'er now
In that ship with the archer carved at her prow:

“And thither I'll bear, an' it be my due,
Your father's son and his grandson too.

“The famed White Ship is mine in the bay;
From Harfleur's harbour she sails today,

With masts fair-pennon'd as Norman spears
And with fifty well-tried mariners.”

Quoth the King: “My ships are chos'n each one,
But I'll not say nay to Stephen's son.

“My son and daughter and fellowship
Shall cross the water in the White Ship.”

The King set sail with the eve's south wind,
And soon he left that coast behind.

The Prince and all his, a princely show,
Remained in the good White Ship to go.

With noble knights and with ladies fair,
With courtiers and sailors gathered there,
Three hundred living souls we were:

And I Berold was the meanest hind
In all that train to the Prince assign'd.

The Prince was a lawless shameless youth;
From his father's loins he sprang without ruth:

Eighteen years till then he had seen,
And the devil's dues in him were eighteen.

And now he cried: “Bring wine from below;
Let the sailors revel ere yet they row:

“Our speed shall o'ertake my father's flight
Though we sail from the harbour at midnight.”

The rowers made good cheer without check,
The lords and ladies obeyed his beck;
The night was light, and they danced on the deck.

But at midnight's stroke they cleared the bay,
And the White Ship furrowed the water-way.

The sails were set, and the oars kept tune
To the double flight of the ship and the moon:

Swifter and swifter the White Ship sped
Till she flew as the spirit flies from the dead:

As white as a lily glimmered she
Like a ship's fair ghost upon the sea.

And the Prince cried, ”Friends, 'tis the hour to sing!
Is a songbird's course so swift on the wing?”

And under the winter stars' still throng,
From brown throats, white throats, merry & strong,
The knights and the ladies raised a song.

A song,—nay, a shriek that rent the sky,
That leaped o'er the deep!—the grievous cry
Of three hundred living that now must die.

An instant shriek that sprang to the shock
As the ship's keel felt the sunken rock.

'Tis said that afar—a shrill strange sigh—
The King's ships heard it and knew not why.

Pale Fitz-Stephen stood by the helm
'Mid all those folk that the waves must whelm.

A great King's heir for the waves to whelm,
And the helpless pilot pale at the helm!

The ship was eager and sucked athirst
As a swimming bladder fills when pierc'd;

And like the moil round a sinking cup,
The waters against her crowded up.

A moment the pilot's senses spin,—
The next he snatched the Prince 'mid the din,
Cut the boat loose, and the youth leaped in.

A few friends leaped with him, standing near.
“Row! the sea's smooth and the night is clear!”

“What! none to be saved but these and I?”
“Row, row as you'd live! All here must die.”

Out of the churn of the choking ship,
Which the gulf grapples and the waves strip,
They struck with the strained oars' flash & dip.

'Twas then o'er the splitting bulwarks' brim
The Prince's sister screamed to him.

He turned about, still rowing apace,
And through the whirled surf he knew her face.

To the toppling decks clave one and all
As a fly cleaves to a chamber-wall.

I Berold was clinging anear;
I prayed for myself and quaked with fear,
But I saw his eyes as he looked at her.

He knew her face and he heard her cry,
And he said, “Put back! she must not die!”

And back through the flying foam they reel
Like a leaf that scuds in a water-wheel.

'Neath the ship's travail they scarce might float,
But he rose and stood in the rocking boat.

Prone the poor ship leaned on the tide:
O'er the naked keel as she best might slide,
The sister toiled to the brother's side.

He reached an oar to her from below,
And stiffened his arms to clutch her so.

But now from the ship some spied the boat,
And “Saved!” was the cry from many a throat:

And down to the boat they leaped and fell:
It turned as a bucket turns in a well,
And nothing was there but the surge & swell.

The Prince that was and the King to come,
There in an instant gone to his doom,

Despite of all England's bended knee
And maugre the Norman fealty!

He was a Prince of lust and pride;
He showed no grace till the hour he died.

When he should be King, he oft would vow,
He'd yoke the peasant to his own plough.
O'er him the ships score their furrows now.

God only knows where his soul did wake,
But I saw him die for his sister's sake.

By none but me can the tale be told,
The butcher of Rouen, poor Berold.
(Lands are swayed by a King on a throne.)
'Twas a royal train put forth to sea,
Yet the tale can be told by none but me.
(The sea hath no King but God alone.)

And now the end came o'er the waters' womb
Like the last great Day that's yet to come.

With prayers in vain and curses in vain,
The White Ship sundered on the mid-main:

And what were men and what was a ship
Were toys and splinters in the sea's grip.

I Berold was down in the sea;
And passing strange though the thing may be,
Of dreams then known I remember me.

Blithe is the shout on Harfleur's strand
When morning lights the sails to land:

And blithe is Honfleur's echoing gloam
When mothers call the children home:

And high do the bells of Rouen beat
When the Body of Christ goes down the street.

These things and the like were heard & shown
In a moment's trance 'neath the sea alone;

And when I rose, 'twas the sea did seem,
And not these things, to be all a dream.

The ship was gone and the crowd was gone,
And the deep shuddered & the moon shone:

And in a strait grasp my arms did span
The mainyard split from the mast where it ran;
And on it with me was another man.

Where lands were none 'neath the dim sea-sky,
We told our names, that man and I.

“O I am Godefroy de l'Aigle hight,
And son I am to a belted knight.”

“And I am Berold the butcher's son
Who slays the beasts in Rouen town.”

Then cried we upon God's name, as we
Did drift on the bitter winter sea.

But lo! a third man rose o'er the wave,
And we said, “Thank God! us three may He save!”

He clutched to the yard with panting stare,
And we looked & knew Fitz-Stephen there.

He clung, and “What of the Prince?” quoth he.
“Lost, lost!” we cried. He cried, “Woe on me!”
And loosed his hold & sank through the sea.

And soul with soul again in that space
We two were together face to face:

And each knew each, as the moments sped,
Less for one living than for one dead:

And every still star overhead
Seemed an eye that knew we were but dead.

And the hours passed; till the noble's son
Sighed, “God be thy help! my strength's foredone!—

“O farewell, friend, for I can no more!”
“Christ take thee!” I moaned; & his life was o'er.

Three hundred souls were all lost but one,
And I drifted over the sea alone.

At last the morning rose o'er the sea
Like an angel's wing that beat tow'rds me.

Sore numbed I was in my sheepskin coat;
Half dead I hung, and might nothing note
Till I woke sun-warmed in a fisher-boat.

The sun was high o'er the eastern brim
As I praised God and gave thanks to Him.

That day I told my tale to a priest,
Who charged me, till the shrift were releas'd,
That I should keep it in mine own breast.

And with the priest I thence did fare
To King Henry's court at Winchester.

We spoke with the King's high chamberlain,
And he wept and mourned again & again,
As if his own son had been slain:

And round us ever there crowded fast
Great men with faces all aghast:

And who so bold that might tell the thing
Which now they knew to their lord the King?
Much woe I learnt in their communing.

The King had watched with a heart sore stirr'd
For two whole days, and this was the third:

And still to all his court would he say,
“What keeps my son so long away?”

And they said:— “The ports lie far and wide
That skirt the swell of the English tide;

“And England's cliffs are not more white
Than her women are, and scarce so light
Her skies as their eyes are blue and bright;

“And in some port that he reached from France
The Prince has lingered for his pleasaùnce.”

But once the King asked: “What distant cry
Was that we heard 'twixt the sea and sky?”

And one said: “With suchlike shouts, pardie!
Do the fishers fling their nets at sea.”

And one: “Who knows not the shrieking quest
When the sea-mew misses its young from the nest?”

'Twas thus till now they had soothed his dread,
Albeit they knew not what they said:

But who should speak today of the thing
That all knew there except the King?

Then pondering much they found a way,
And met round the King's high seat that day:

And the King sat with a heart sore stirr'd,
And seldom he spoke and seldom heard.

'Twas then through the hall the King was 'ware
Of a little boy with golden hair,

As bright as the golden poppy is
That the beach breeds for the surf to kiss:

Yet pale his cheek as the thorn in Spring,
And his garb black like the raven's wing.

Nothing heard but his foot through the hall,
For now the lords were silent all.

And the King wondered, and said, “Alack!
Who sends me a fair boy dressed in black?

“Why, sweet heart, do you pace through the hall
As though my court were a funeral?”

Then lowly knelt the child at the dais,
And looked up weeping in the King's face.

“O wherefore black, O King, ye may say,
For white is the hue of death today.

“Your son and all his fellowship
Lie in the Sea's bed with the White Ship.”

King Henry fell as a man struck dead;
And speechless still he stared from his bed
When to him next day my rede I read.

There's many an hour must needs beguile
A King's high heart that he should smile,—

Full many a lordly hour, full fain
Of his realm's rule and pride of his reign:—

But this King never smiled again.

By none but me can the tale be told,
The butcher of Rouen, poor Berold.
(Lands are swayed by a King on a throne.)
'Twas a royal train put forth to sea,
Yet the tale can be told by none but me.
(The sea hath no King but God alone.)

------

(To Lucy Rossetti for her children,
with her brother's and their uncle's love.)

1880
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POPnews - November 25th

2009-11-25T00:01:00.000-08:00

[The most poignant image from the State Funeral of slain US President
John F. Kennedy came when the President's son, John F. Kennedy, Jr.
saluted the passing cortege as it emerged from Washington DC's
St. Matthew's Cathedral; for an added blow to the solar plexus,
consider that the event occurred on John-John's third birthday.]
1034 - When Scotland's King Máel Coluim mac Cináeda (otherwise known as Malcolm II) died Donnchad (anglicized as Duncan) - the son of Malcolm's daughter Bethóc and Crínán of Dunkeld - inherited his throne; Duncan I is best remembered today as a character in William Shakespeare's play Macbeth.

1120 - The White Ship Disaster claimed William Adelin, only heir of Henry I of England; his death resulted in The Anarchy, a crisis over a disputed succession considered by many to have been the first English civil war.

1177 - Saladin was defeated at the Battle of Montgisard by Raynald of Chatillon and Baldwin IV, King of Jerusalem.

1758 - The city of Pittsburgh was founded.

1767 - Poland's King Stanislaus II was crowned at St. John's Cathedral in Warsaw.

1783 - The last British troops withdrew from New York City under the terms of the Treaty of Paris, marking the end of the American Revolution.

1795 - Poland's King Stanislaus II was forced to abdicate, and thereafter went into exile to Russia.

1809 - British diplomat Benjamin Bathurst disappeared in the German town of Perleberg, and is presumed to have been murdered, although his body has never been found.

1839 - 300,000 people died when Coringa, India, was hit by three tidal waves as part of a 40 foot storm surge; it had previously been hit in 1789 and rebuilt, but in the wake of this tragedy was abandoned.

1864 - The so-called Confederate Army of Manhattan, led by one Jacob Thompson, attempted to burn down New York City on that year's Election Day.

1874 - The United States Greenback Party was established as a political party consisting primarily of farmers affected by the Panic of 1873.

1947 - The so-called Hollywood Ten - Alvah Bessie, Herbert Biberman, Lester Cole, Edward Dmytryk, Ring Lardner Jr., John Howard Lawson, Albert Maltz, Samuel Ornitz, Adrian Scott, and Dalton Trumbo - were officially blacklisted, prevented from working in American movies due to their supposed Communist sympathies.

1952 - The Mousetrap, Agatha Christie's redoubtable sleuther, hit the boards of London's New Ambassadors Theatre; transferred next door to the St Martin's Theatre in 1974, it's still running after 23,000+ performances. Based on a true story made fiction as Three Blind Mice (also by Christie) it's the longest-running stage play in history.

1960 - The Dominican Republic's Mirabal sisters were assassinated.

1963 - President John F. Kennedy was laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery.

1970 - Japanese novelist Yukio Mishima committed ritual suicide - seppuku - in Tokyo following a failed coup attempt.

1973 - Greece's far-right-wing junta, headed by George Papadopoulos, was ousted by another, slightly-less-right-wing, junta led by Dimitrios Ioannides under the figurehead President Phaidon Gizikis.

1984 - Largely at the behest of Bob Geldof, Band Aid recorded Do They Know It's Christmas - at Midge Ure's home studio in London's Notting Hill.

1992 - Czechoslovakia voted to split itself into the Czech Republic and Slovakia, which it would do just 36 days later.
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Pop History Moment: The Killing of Lee Harvey Oswald

2009-11-24T00:40:00.001-08:00

Even as a punditling*, whenever I saw this bit of film all I could think is 'bullshit'; this couldn't look more set up if... Well, I can't think of a suitable comparison, because this couldn't possibly look more set up**. And yet, we don't see much except Lee Harvey Oswald falling, culminating in yet another famous photograph from that terrible week...

As narrated by Ed Herlihy, though, one of the most significant plot twists in the story of the assassination of John F. Kennedy takes on the necessary gravitas; Oswald's assassin, Jack Ruby, would die of a 'heart attack' in January 1967 before a new trial might have given history a better glimpse into Ruby's motivation on this day in 1963.

The damage this crime caused to the investigation into the killing of the President is immeasurable; one thing it did do was cement the importance of television in the life of Americans, seeing as it took place live on the air. Any generation, not just the Baby Boomers, who'd witnessed such a thing would most assuredly remain riveted to the box on the off chance that something like it might happen again...

*The technical term for a pundit under the age of 13.
**A photograph taken shortly before an assassination attempt made against Pope John Paul II comes close.
*

Remembering... Carlo Collodi

2009-11-24T00:35:00.000-08:00

The best children's literature ought to appeal to adults as well; inasmuch as we were all children once, and surely enjoy reconnecting with our earlier innocence, adults are also the ones who read the kiddies their books from the time they are very young. If we are engaged by the stories and the characters we are reading to them, so will they continue to be engaged by reading as they grow older...

Carlo Collodi (born on this day in 1826) obviously understood this, as his most famous book The Adventures of Pinocchio is so much more than an amusing Quixote-like picaresque designed to amuse the bambini, but a piquant allegory on adult themes such as class and upward mobility. The story was originally serialized between 1881 and 1883, at which time it was given a second half and published in its present form. Unique among children's fiction today (although not in those days), Pinocchio's adventures include many frightening or dangerous events, which too many modern children are prevented from discovering in the relative safety of their imaginations by over-protective parents.

Pinocchio's fame was slow to take off, and Collodi died in 1890 before the advent of moving pictures and major advances in child literacy made his characters household names; the book's translation into English in 1911, the advocacy of its moral teachings by Benedetto Croce, as much as a 1940 film version by Walt Disney did much to cement the reputation of the marionette who dreamed of one day becoming a real boy firmly within the pop cultural firmament - so much so that not even a poorly received 2002 film adaptation (starring Roberto Benigni) could diminish it.
*

Happy Birthday Billy Connolly

2009-11-24T00:30:00.000-08:00

Years ago, Billy Connolly was a well-kept secret among my Caledoniaphile* friends and I; we'd collect his concert tapes (and there are many) and watch or listen to them until we could recite them backwards. To this day, I know someone who, if he's having a bad day, I only have to call an 'aggressive sweetie' to make even his worst anomie dissolve like so much fairy floss...

Since those halcyon days of the early 90s, Connolly's become more of a name on this side of the pond; still not the stature he has in the UK - yet - but thanks to high-profile appearances in films from art house (Mrs. Brown) to blockbuster (Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events), not to mention the prevalence of YouTube and a plethora of new ways to get the word out he's no longer the sly secret of a select few, but belongs at last to the multitudes...

*A fancy way of saying 'Scots-loving'...
*

"Crying Over You" by Platinum Blonde

2009-11-24T00:25:00.000-08:00

On this day in 2008 bassist and keyboardist Kenny MacLean was found dead of an unspecified heart ailment... He was 52.

Scottish-born MacLean wasn't a founding member of Canadian glam-rock outfit Platinum Blonde, but he did come on board just as the group found its greatest fame with the monster hit album Alien Shores - which says more than I ever could in the space allotted about the importance in life of seizing an opportunity and running with it.

Crying Over You was arguably the band's biggest hit, placing MacLean and his new bandmates front and centre in Canada's thriving music scene at the height of the 1980s.
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"Grace Darling" by William Wordsworth

2009-11-24T00:20:00.000-08:00

Among the dwellers in the silent fields
The natural heart is touched, and public way
And crowded street resound with ballad strains,
Inspired by ONE whose very name bespeaks
Favour divine, exalting human love;
Whom, since her birth on bleak Northumbria's coast,
Known unto few but prized as far as known,
A single Act endears to high and low
Through the whole land--to Manhood, moved in spite
Of the world's freezing cares--to generous Youth--
To Infancy, that lisps her praise--to Age
Whose eye reflects it, glistening through a tear
Of tremulous admiration. Such true fame
Awaits her 'now'; but, verily, good deeds
Do not imperishable record find
Save in the rolls of heaven, where hers may live
A theme for angels, when they celebrate
The high-souled virtues which forgetful earth
Has witnessed. Oh! that winds and waves could speak
Of things which their united power called forth
From the pure depths of her humanity!
A Maiden gentle, yet, at duty's call,
Firm and unflinching, as the Lighthouse reared
On the Island-rock, her lonely dwelling-place;
Or like the invincible Rock itself that braves,
Age after age, the hostile elements,
As when it guarded holy Cuthbert's cell.
All night the storm had raged, nor ceased, nor paused,
When, as day broke, the Maid, through misty air,
Espies far off a Wreck, amid the surf,
Beating on one of those disastrous isles--
Half of a Vessel, half--no more; the rest
Had vanished, swallowed up with all that there
Had for the common safety striven in vain,
Or thither thronged for refuge. With quick glance
Daughter and Sire through optic-glass discern,
Clinging about the remnant of this Ship,
Creatures--how precious in the Maiden's sight!
For whom, belike, the old Man grieves still more
Than for their fellow-sufferers engulfed
Where every parting agony is hushed,
And hope and fear mix not in further strife.
"But courage, Father! let us out to sea--
A few may yet be saved." The Daughter's words,
Her earnest tone, and look beaming with faith,
Dispel the Father's doubts: nor do they lack
The noble-minded Mother's helping hand
To launch the boat; and with her blessing cheered,
And inwardly sustained by silent prayer,
Together they put forth, Father and Child!
Each grasps an oar, and struggling on they go--
Rivals in effort; and, alike intent
Here to elude and there surmount, they watch
The billows lengthening, mutually crossed
And shattered, and re-gathering their might;
As if the tumult, by the Almighty's will
Were, in the conscious sea, roused and prolonged
That woman's fortitude--so tried, so proved--
May brighten more and more!

True to the mark,
They stem the current of that perilous gorge,
Their arms still strengthening with the strengthening heart,
Though danger, as the Wreck is neared, becomes
More imminent. Not unseen do they approach;
And rapture, with varieties of fear
Incessantly conflicting, thrills the frames
Of those who, in that dauntless energy,
Foretaste deliverance; but the least perturbed
Can scarcely trust his eyes, when he perceives
That of the pair--tossed on the waves to bring
Hope to the hopeless, to the dying, life--
One is a Woman, a poor earthly sister,
Or, be the Visitant other than she seems,
A guardian Spirit sent from pitying Heaven,
In woman's shape. But why prolong the tale,
Casting weak words amid a host of thoughts
Armed to repel them? Every hazard faced
And difficulty mastered, with resolve
That no one breathing should be left to perish,
This last remainder of the crew are all
Placed in the little boat, then o'er the deep
Are safely borne, landed upon the beach,
And, in fulfilment of God's mercy, lodged
Within the sheltering Lighthouse.--Shout, ye Waves
Send forth a song of triumph. Waves and Winds,
Exult in this deliverance wrought through faith
In Him whose Providence your rage hath served!
Ye screaming Sea-mews, in the concert join!
And would that some immortal Voice--a Voice
Fitly attuned to all that gratitude
Breathes out from floor or couch, through pallid lips
Of the survivors--to the clouds might bear--
Blended with praise of that parental love,
Beneath whose watchful eye the Maiden grew
Pious and pure, modest and yet so brave,
Though young so wise, though meek so resolute--
Might carry to the clouds and to the stars,
Yea, to celestial Choirs, GRACE DARLING'S name!

1843.
*

In Memoriam: Grace Darling

2009-11-24T00:15:00.000-08:00

History is filled with evidence of intellectual ferocity and feats of derring-do as committed by the so-called 'weaker sex'; it seems to me the only weakness involved is in the minds of the men who write 'history', for both promulgating and regurgitating such patently false balderdash...

Born this day in 1815 at Bamburgh, Grace Darling grew up at the seashore, raised as she was by a lighthouse keeper; it was at one such place - the Longstone Lighthouse on the Farne Islands - when Grace Darling committed the single act that assured her immortality.

Observing the SS Forfarshire run aground in September 1838, the 22-year-old Grace and her father took to the lifeboat in heavy seas and rescued nine crewmen from certain death. Accolades were immediately forthcoming; she was made the subject of poems and paintings. There is a museum dedicated to her in the town where she was born and - in October 1842, at the age of 26 - died... Mor recently singer/songwriter Dave Cousins of Strawbs wrote Grace Darling (from their 1975 album Ghosts) in tribute and as a love song.

Amazingly, Grace Darling wasn't even the first such courageous woman to prove her mettle in the midst of stormy seas; ten years previously, in July 1828, Ann Harvey of Newfoundland had assisted in the rescue of 163 people shipwrecked from the Despatch near Isle aux Morts over a grueling four days when she was just 17. A Canadian, Roberta Boyd, rescued 2 men in New Brunswick from a similar predicament in the 1880s. Which only goes to show that misogyny is just so much claptrap!
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"Who Wants To Live Forever" by Queen

2009-11-24T00:10:00.000-08:00

Who Wants to Live Forever is arguably one of Queen's most moving songs, and one which took on a whole new meaning on this day in 1991 - the day its singer died...

Appearing on their 1986 album A Kind of Magic, written by Brian May and sung as a duet between himself and Freddie Mercury, it was recorded for the soundtrack of the film Highlander, and released on September 15th of that year.
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