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On November 29, 1962, a benefit concert called "The American Pageant of the Arts" was held with "a cast of 100, including President and Mrs. Kennedy, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Leonard Bernstein (as master of ceremonies), Pablo Casals, Marian Anderson, Van Cliburn, Robert Frost, Fredric March, Benny Goodman, Bob Newhart and a 7-year-old Chinese cellist called Yo-Yo Ma.
Tom Magliozzi, one of public radio's most popular personalities, died on Monday November 3rd of complications from Alzheimer's disease. He was 77 years old.
Tom and his brother, Ray, became famous as "Click and Clack the Tappet Brothers" on the weekly NPR show Car Talk. They bantered, told jokes, laughed and sometimes even gave pretty good advice to listeners who called in... Continue reading
George Gershwin was born in Brooklyn in 1898. He began his musical career as a song-plugger on Tin Pan Alley, and published his first song, “When You Want ‘Em, You Can’t Get ‘Em,” which earned him five dollars. Soon after, he co-composed “Swanee”, which sold more than a million copies.
In 1924, George collaborated with his brother, lyricist Ira Gershwin, to write musicals including “Funny Face... Continue reading
Teenager, Clara Lemlich riled up the masses at the Cooper Union and touched off the first strike in the garment industry in New York City. Approximately 25,000 workers, mostly women are walking the picket line. Intolerable conditions and pay are the basis for this work stoppage.
Ford Motor Company rented space from an old wagon manufacturing shop for $75 a month to open its first factory in 1903. They earned roughly $37,000 in its first year-and-a-half of business, turning out an average of 15 cars a day and selling each automobile for $200.
Frank Lloyd Wright was born in Richland Center, Wisconsin on June 8, 1867 to William and Anna Wright. While attending college at the University of Wisconsin, he took a job in the engineering department but left two years later to follow his dream to design buildings, finding work as an architect in Chicago.
Wright married Catherine Tobin when he was twenty-two and was determined to design and... Continue reading
In the early 1920s Du Pont held the U.S patented rights for Cellophane but also owned a problem that came along with it. Cellophane was ineffective for food packaging because water vapor was seeping in. It took William Hale Charch and his team of Du Pont researchers 2,000 test trials and a four–year commitment to realize their goal – a discovery and patent of an effective moisture-proofing... Continue reading
"Good evening, friends". Roosevelt's first fireside chat was March 12, 1933. This was the first of a series of 30 radio broadcasts to the American people reassuring everyone that the nation was going to recover. He shared his hopes and plans for the country. The chats ranged from fifteen to forty-five minutes and eighty percent of the words used were in the one thousand most... Continue reading
He became a star on the radio recycling his newspaper pieces. From 1930 to 1935, his radio show on Sunday nights The Gulf Headliners, ranked among the top radio programs in the country.
He rambled from one subject to another and often lost track of the half-hour time limit. To correct this, he brought in a wind-up alarm clock to alert him to when to begin wrapping up his comments. Later his... Continue reading
He was the first to coin the phrase,”rock and roll” on public radio, a term to describe the genre of music style. He is one of several key individuals who helped bridge the gap of segregation among young teenage Americans.
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Steve Martin standup on The Smothers Brothers show | 1968
Stephen Glenn "Steve" Martin born August 14, 1945 is an American actor, comedian, writer, producer and musician. Martin came to public notice in the 1960s as a writer for the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, and later as a frequent guest on The Tonight Show. In the 1970s, Martin performed his offbeat, absurdist comedy routines before packed houses on national tours. Since the 1980s, having branched away from comedy, Martin has become a successful actor, as well as an author, playwright, pianist and banjo player, eventually earning him an Emmy, Grammy and American Comedy awards, among other honors.