In 1866, after transatlantic cable was laid on the ocean floor, President Buchanan spoke to England's Queen Victoria.
Our 31st president, Herbert Hoover, was born on this date in 1874. He was the first president born west of the Mississippi; a member of Stanford University's first graduating class; and the first president to have a telephone installed at his desk. Of course, it was during his presidency that America entered "the great depression."
On this date in 1948, Allen Funt's "Candid Microphone," later titled "Candid Camera," debuted on TV.
In 1954, workers at the Studebaker-Packard plant took a pay cut.
On this date in 1972, Paul McCartney was arrested for possessing pot in Sweden.
Antonio Banderas is 49. Rosanna Arquette hits the big 5-0 today, and Jimmy Dean turns 81 today.
Lazy Day -- Top 5 signs we're getting too lazy:
Ballparks that now let fans order food by cell phone
Campbell's Soup at Hand, packaged in insulated sipping cups
Talking caller ID
The remote controlled den - lights, fireplace, fan, blinds, etc.
Pooper-scooper services
Yesterday was Daughter Day -- the second Sunday in August. We'll name a celebrity, you tell us who their famous daughter is:
Goldie Hawn (Kate Hudson)
Janet Leigh (Jamie Lee Curtis)
Judy Garland (Liza Minnelli)
Diane Ladd (Laura Dern)
Jon Voight (Angelina Jolie)
Debbie Reynolds (Carrie Fisher)
Henry Fonda (Jane Fonda)
Pricilla Beaulieu (Lisa Marie Presley)
Ravi Shankar (Norah Jones)
Blythe Danner (Gwyneth Paltrow)
Whitney Blake (Meredith Baxter)
Victor Kiriakis (Jennifer Aniston)
Edgar Bergen (Candice Bergen)
Tippi Hedren (Melanie Griffith)
THIS WEEK IS
Elvis Week -- August 8-16. Here are 20 things you should know about the King:
Even in the south, Elvis was a pretty strange name. "The first time I heard it, I said 'Weird name,'" recalls Scotty Moore, who played guitar at Presley's first recording session at Sam Phillip's Sun Records. "Sam's secretary wrote it down for me."
Elvis had an amazing memory. He'd hear songs on the radio and then sing them immediately. "It seemed like he knew every song in the world," Moore says. "Country, pop, R&B. Elvis had a sponge for a brain when it came to lyrics."
He was very polite. "He was always taught manners," Sam Phillips says. "His mother thought there was no reason to treat people except with great respect. If you didn't say 'yessir' and 'nosir', that was a cardinal sin."
But you wouldn't like him when he was angry. "He was real slow to anger," Phillips says. "But once he was angered pound for pound I don't know of a person who was stronger. I remember one time at the gas station out the back of the Peabody Hotel. This one person who didn't like his long sideburns wouldn't leave him alone. Elvis had him down on the concrete in no time flat."
Colonel Tom Parker really was a colonel. Kind of. Presley's legendary manager was given an honorary colonel's commission in October 1948 by Louisiana governor Jimmie Davis. Parker did serve in the U.S. Army in 1930 and 1931, but he didn't attain the rank of colonel. (Parker wasn't his real name, either.)
Elvis's gold suit was the genuine article. The colonel had it designed for him for the opening date of a 10-city tour in 1957. It was made by famous Hollywood tailor Nudie Cohen and cost $2,500. During the show, Elvis fell to his knees and left a pile of gold leaf on the stage. Afterward, a distraught Parker begged him never to do such a move again.
He really loved his mother, Gladys. At her funeral in 1958, he tried to jump into her grave. For days afterward, he carried him nightgown around with him.
Uncle Sam first got him into drugs. Private Presley was given amphetamine pills by a sergeant in 1958, and he became an epic pill enthusiast. He bought them in quart bottles from the dispensary.
But he never got drunk. Ernst Jorgensen, RCA Records' official Presley archivist and historian: "It wasn't like Elvis never drank alcohol as a principle. He just drank very little."
He was a very spiritual man. Larry Geller, who became Presley's hairdresser and guru in 1964, introduced him to spirituality. Geller gave him books he would cherish for the rest of his life: Autobiography of a Yogi, The Impersonal Life and Beyond the Himalayas. "I've always known there had to be a purpose for my life," Presley once said, "There's got to be a reason why I was chosen to be Elvis Presley.
He nearly became a monk. In March 1965, Presley, driving his RV outside of Flagstaff, Arizona, saw the face of Joseph Stalin in a cloud. "And then it happened," he said. "The face of Stalin turned into the face of Jesus, and every fiver of my being felt it." He decided to enter a monastery. Then he changed his mind and began work on the film Harum Scarum instead.
He made 31 movies over 13 years. "Elvis hated most of those later films," says friend and bodyguard Red West. "I mean, in Stay Away, Joe they had him singing to a bull."
Elvis could pick hits. But he couldn't write his own songs. "There are exceptions, when he changed arrangements so drastically that he got a writer's credit," Ernst Jorgensen says. "That's what happened on 'Don't Be Cruel' and 'All Shook Up'. But Elvis never thought of himself as a writer."
He once slept with the entire chorus line of a French nightclub show. On leave in Paris in 1959, Presley and several of his army friends took the dancers from the Lido nightclub back to their hotel suite. The next afternoon, the Lido's manager called the hotel. He needed the girls back, he insisted, so he could reopen for business that night.
He never sold more records in a year than in 1956. That's when the single "Hound Dog" and its B-side, "Don't Be Cruel," sold 4.6 million copies in the United States.
And never fewer than he sold in 1967. That year was the nadir of his Hollywood period. "The Easy Come, Easy Go EP never charted," Jorgensen says. "That's when Presley's management realized something had to change. The movie was horrible. The songs were poor and poorly recorded, with bad arrangements. And Elvis didn't sing them particularly well. I'm told the Cokes and burgers during the sessions were OK."
He didn't think the Las Vegas comeback was going to work. Sam Phillips went to Presley's opening night in Vegas in July 1968. "He combed his damn hair about 50 times before he went out, and that was a pretty good indication that he was real nervous," Phillips recalls. "he hadn't been on stage for about nine years. But before he got through his opening medley, there was a standing ovation. And then everything was over, baby."
Pinball Wizard? Nope. "He loved pinball," Phillips says, "but he liked to cheat a little bit. That's the only thing I ever saw him cheat on.
Elvis was an officer of the Memphis police force. Shelby County sheriff Roy Nixon made the King a chief deputy in 1970. He had legal authority, and could have made arrests.
"Fat Elvis" wasn't as fat as commonly believed. "He was a lot less overweight than people think," Jorgensen says. "In the Fat Elvis period, the last three years of his career, he was bloated. He had a lot of water in his body.
THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW
If you're keeping score, there are now 34 million Americans on food stamps.
"The Tonight Show" have lost some 2 million viewers since Conan O'Brien took over the show.
Within hours of Michael Jackson's death, his family descended on his house, grabbing everything they thought could be of value. Word is that LaToya grabbed a hard-drive containing lots of recorded but previously unreleased songs... including ones he did with Ne-Yo, Akon, and will.i.am.
Insiders say there are over a hundred recorded, produced and ready to release Michael Jackson songs that will be coming out over the next several years... some recordings going back to the 1980s!
By the way, part of Neverland Ranch might be dismantled and taken to Las Vegas for a Michael Jackson exhibit.
In Tulare, California, the city is under fire for shutting down an 8-year-old's lemonade stand... as she was trying to raise money to go to Disneyland.
Director John Hughes died of a heart attack last week at age 59. Among his credits: "Sixteen Candles", "The Breakfast Club," "Weird Science," 'Ferris Bueller's Day Off", "Home Alone", "Beethoven" and "Trains, Planes and Automobiles."
Chris Brown has lost his endorsement deal with chewing gum brand Wrigley. after being charged with assaulting his then-girlfriend Rihanna.
President Barack Obama and wife Michelle are edging out Hollywood stars on Vanity Fair's International Best-Dressed List. The president makes the list for the first time in issues out Wednesday, joining his wife, who has been named twice before.
Hughes movie alum, Molly Ringwald, has been busy with her twins born last month, Roman and Adele.
Paula Abdul says that many "wonderful things are being offered to me."
Meanwhile, the producers of "American Idol" say it's Simon, Randy and Kara for now... but there most likely will be a 4th judge added.
Katie Holmes is rumored to be joining the movie, "Sex and the City 2."
Tom Sizemore has been arrested... again... this time, a domestic violence charge.
Kate Gosselin sat down with Meredith Viera on the "Today Show" this morning to tell her side of the split with Jon.
Rihanna, Jay-Z, Kanye West will all be on Jay Leno's first prime time show, September 14th.
A plane carrying Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore had to make an emergency landing Thursday in Las Vegas after the engine apparently overheated.
The Washington town of Forks is enjoying a nice boom in tourism, thanks to the "Twilight" books and movies. Among the questions asked by tourists: Is it safe to go camping with the vampire problems in the area?
Glamour magazine says the following female habits that really freak men out:
Wearing uncomfortable shoes
Doing sad things on purpose like watching sad movies or TV shoes or listening to sad music
Reading your guy's horoscope
Asking hypothetical questions
Making the bed
When it's hammer time, bet on a woman to hit the nail on the head more often than a man, says a new study. "Women were about 10% more accurate than men," says study leader Duncan Irschick of the University of Massachusetts. For this skirmish in the war of the sexes, researchers set up a mental plate with sensors to measure force and accuracy. Next, they placed larger and small targets on the plate, representing large and small nails. Then they let the lads and lassies whack away. "Also we filmed how close subjects hammered," says Irschick, "and how close the subject hammered to the target was an index of accuracy." In an odd twist, the men redeemed themselves when the scientists decided to text how well each gender hit nails with the lights out. "Men were about 25% more accurate than women in the dark," says Irschick. "Apparently men and women differ in their ability to perceive objects in light versus dark environments." (National Examiner)
Hump Day is Jump Day more people kill themselves in the middle of the work week than on any other day, according to a new study. While songs often decry Monday as the most depressing of the week, nearly 25% of all suicides happen on Wednesday because of midweek job stress, reveals a nationwide, five year study in the journal Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology. Monday and Saturday tied for a distant second at 14% each. "Everyone talks about the Monday blues," says study spearhead Augustine J. Kposowa, professor of sociology at the University of California, Riverside. "Now it's the middle of the week that's the problem. People may be fed up and stressed by their jobs. (National Examiner)
According to Women's Health, the top three things the Average Woman keeps a secret about are:
The notches on her bedpost
The number on her scale
The amount of cash she blows on shopping sprees
The top fear both men and women have while driving is getting lost. According to Fodor's Road Guides USA, 43% of those surveyed said getting lost is their #1 travel mishap worry. Even men were worried about getting lost Specifically, 37% of men were nervous about getting lost, compared with 46% of women. So why is it men won't ask for directions?
A recent Olay Shower Secrets Survey found women are more likely to view showers as a destination where they can escape, take their time and think without interruptions, while men view showers as just another part of their daily routine.
