FORGOTTEN BOOK: UNCLE SILAS

 Uncle Silas by J. Sheridan Le Fanu (1864)

I'm cheating here because I have never read this book.  Lord knows I have tried.  Four or five times over the past decades.  This is not to knock the book, nor its writer.  I am a big fan of Le Fanu's writing and have read and enjoyed all of his shorter works.  But Uncle Silas...something has always arisen and interrupted my reading of the novel...a family emergency, a conflict in my work schedule, or merely my misplacing my copy of the book...always something.  Is the universe conspiring against me?  i don't know.  But, damn, I really want to read the book.  Some day I finally will.

The book was based on/Le Fanu's story "A Passage in the Secret History of an Irish Countess" (1839; also published as "The Murdered Cousin" in Le Fanu's Ghost Stories and Tales of Mystery, 1851).  The novel, which moved the setting of the story from Ireland to England, was first printed as a serial, "Maud Ruthyn and Uncle Silas," in the Dublin University Magazine in 1864; it was then published as a three-volume novel (because that's what they did back in those days) later that year.  Uncle Silas has remained Le Fanu's best-known novel, and rightly so.

From Wikipedia:  "Uncle Silas, subtitles 'A Tale of Bartram Haugh,' is an 1864 Victorian Gothic mystery-thriller novel by the Irish writer J. Sheridan Le Fanu.  Despite Le Fanu resisting its classification as such, the novel has also been hailed as a work of sensation fiction by contemporary reviewers and modern critics alike.  It is an early example of the locked-room mystery subgenre, rather than a novel of the supernatural (despite a few creepily ambiguous touches), but does show a strong interest in the occult and in the ideas of Emanuel Swedenborg, a Swedish scientist, philosopher and Christian mystic...It was the source of Arthur Conan Doyle's The Firm of Girdlestone. and remains a touchstone for contemporary mystery fiction."  The influence of Uncle Silas is obvious in Wilkie Collins' The Woman in White; perhaps it's the other way around -- the Collins novel was published a few years before Uncle Silas, bit well after the Le Fanu genesis story (unsolicited plug:  Collins' best novel; don't believe the naysayers who tout for The Moonstone.)

Uncle Silas relates the tale of young Maud Ruthyn, who grows close to her uncle. Silas Ruthyn, the family black sheep who had been a noted  rake and gambler and now professes to be a reformed and devout Christian.  In the past, Silas had been suspected to be involved in the suspected suicide of a man to whom Silas owed a great deal of money, a suicide which took place in a locked room in Silas' mansion at Bartram-Haugh.  Maud's father suddenly dies and a codicil in his will places her with Uncle Silas as her guardian until she reaches her majority.  If Maud should die before them her estate would pass to Uncle Silas... 

(I am torn between who is more evil, Uncle Silas or Wilkie Collins' Count Fosco.  I'm leaning toward Fosco but will reserve full judgement until I finally read the Le Fanu book.)

Le Fanu (1814-1873) is considered a central figure in the development of the modern ghost story.  M. R. James (no slouch in the field himself) consider Le Fanu as "absolutely in the first rank as a writer of ghost stories."  Le Fanu was also a major influence in the development of the mystery novel.  Among his best-known works are the stories "Green Tea," "Schalken the Painter," "Carmilla" (which I covered in this blog yesterday), "The Familiar," "Mr. Justice Harbottle," the sensation novels Wylder's Hand, The Wyvern Mystery, The Rose and the Key, and the historical novel The House by the Churchyard.  and of course, Uncle Silas.

Uncle Silas has been filmed at least five times, and three adaptations have aired on BBC Radio.

CBS RADIO MYSTERY THEATER: CARMILLA (JULY 31, 1975)

Sheridan Le Fanu's claasic 1872 vampire tale besides being a thumping good tale is an early example of feminism in the horror genre, defying the Victorian view of women as being possessions of men.  It is also perhaps the first story about a lesbian vampire (told oh so tastefully, mind you).  The story became a large influence on Bram Stoker's Dracula, as well as Henry James's The Turn of the Screw.  

The popular story has remained in print for more than 150 years.  It has been filmed or adapted fourteen times since 1931,   Carmilla has appeared at least three times on television, four times on stage, and once as an opera, as well as in a web series.  The character has appeared in at least six books in recent years, has been the subject of three comic book series, and has inspired at least four rock music recordings.  Carmilla has become a character in two video games.  In Japan, Carmilla is the title of a lesbian magazine.

Carmilla hit the radio airwaves beginning in 1940 on the Columbia Workshop, starring Jeanette Nolan. Vincent Price hosted as 1979 adaptation on the Sears Radio Theater.  In 2003, a version was aired on BBC Radio 4's Afternoon Play.

The CBS Radio Mystery Theater version (linked below) starred Marian Seldes and Merccedes McCambridge, and was hosted by E. G. Marsahll.

Enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOtnr0o7FHw&list=PLJm2etPj4-MYlykH8VeSx_9v9SlR5gGWX&index=26 

SHORT STORY WEDNESDAY: THE ROMANCE OF ROSY RIDGE

"The Romance of Rosy Ridge" by MacKinley Kantor  (first published in The Saturday Evening Post, June 5, 1937; published in book form that year, although it had only 96 pages; reprinted in Post Stories of 1937, 1938; and in The Pocket Book of American Modern Short Stories, edited by Philip Van Doren Stern, 1943)

"It was good corn growing weather that July night when the stranger first came along, making his music through the hollow all the way up to Rosy Ridge.  Old Gill MacBean and his wife and the youngsters were sitting out on the stoop when they heard the man coming."

It's post-Civil War Missouri and tensions from that conflict are still high.  People in the community appeared to be evenly divided; you'd see as many men wearing old Yankee blue trousers as you would wearing the old butternut yellow trousers of the Confederacy.  MacBean had no truck with Yankees -- he had lost two sons fighting for the South, as well as a brother at Willow Creek.  And the area had been plagued by night riders so MacBean kept his rifle handy.

The stranger was making music the like of which MacBean had never heard.  First he played Gentle Annie, then Billy Boy, then Jack o' Diamonds -- all while slowly walking up to the MacBean place.  The music had a strange humming noise, unlike any instrument MacBean had ever heard before.  It turned out that it was just a comb and a piece of paper.  The stranger introduced himself as Henry Bohun (soon to be called Comb-Humming Henry), a schoolmaster before he began wandering.  Henry played a tune that no one could dance to, "but it was a song to make you love, and perish happy in the remarkable joy of doing it."  (Henry said, "Well, maybe it hadn't ever been played before in these parts.  It comes all the way from Europe, and a man named Liszt made it up.")  MacBean was suspicious at first of Henry, (he was also a little taken aback when he introduced his two pus -- Paul and Agrippa -- to Henry, saying that he named them so because Paul came before Agrippa in the Bible; Henry responded, "You haven't got Jesus and Pontius Pilate, then, somewhere around, because I seem to have read Jesus came before Pontius Pilate too.").  Anyway, MacBean extended his hospitality to the stranger, offering him food and a place to spend the night.

And, of course, MacBean had a daughter -- Lissy, with strawberry-yellow hair and clear blue eyes and little freckles that were on her smooth round cheeks and her soft mouth smiling...

The story is not called "The Romance at Rosy Ridge" for nothing.

And then MacBean discovered that Henry had fought for the Union and he banished Henry from his home and from Lissy, fully expecting Henry to take up wandering again.  But Henry stayed in the area just to be close to Lissy, even though he could not be see her.

And then the night riders came...

A gentle, folksy, lyrical, and life-affirming story..

The author is best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Andersonville.  He also wrote The Voice of Bugle Ann, Gentle Annie, Glory for Me (filmed as The Best Years of Our Life), and If the South Had Won the Civil War (an early alternate history novel).

The story was expanded slightly and made into a popular film (although it ended up losing half a million dollars -- go figure) in 1947, starring Van Johnson, Thomas Mitchell, and Janet Leigh (her first film role).  The film had an amazing cast, including Marshal Thompson (later to play Dr. Marsh Tracy in Daktari), Dean Stockwell, Guy Kibbee, Jim Davis, Paul Langton (perhaps best known as Leslie Harrington in TV's Peyton Place, and O. Z. Whitehead (one of John Ford's stock players; he was Al Joad in The Grapes of Wrath, and showed his virtuosity in The Man who Shot Liberty Valance, where at age 51, he played a lollipop licking schoolboy).   The film was also notable for its uncredited actors, including Barbara Billingsley (Beaver's Mom. June Cleaver), Gail Davis (TV's Annie Oakley), Marie Windsor (known as "the queen of the B's") Kermit Maynard (Ken's brother), Guy Stockwell (Dean's brother), I. Stanford Jolley (you'll know him when you see him; he was a very familiar western heavy in over 300 films and television shows); and Rhea Mitchell (one-time co-star of many of William S. Hart's westerns; her career faded soon after this, and she managed an apartment house in retirement until a disgruntled houseboy strangled and killed her when she was 66 -- not all Hollywood stories end prettily).

Anyway, it's a great flick and you can see it here:

https://archive.org/details/the-romance-of-rosy-ridge

OVERLOOKED TV: THE ADVENTURES Of DR. FU MANCHU: THE MASTER PLAN OF DR. FU MANCHU (NOVEMBER 12, 1956)

Weak tea, this.

If you are expecting the thrill a minute, pulse-pounding excitement of a master villain trying to take over the world, you may want to look elsewhere.

Sax Rohmer's Dr. Fu Manchu has been thrilling readers since 1912 with his somewhat creaky, imaginative, jingoistic plots and his demotic scientific horrors, often involving murderous animals and dangerous dacoits.  Through thirteen novels and fix-ups, as well as a handful of stories, Rohmer blazed the trail for the "Yellow Menace" pulp stories that also weaved its way through films, radio, television, conic strips, comic books, and additions to the franchise by other authors.  For over a hundred years, the criminal genius of the Si-Fan tong has poured his vengeance on the Occidental world, often with startlingly effective results, and sometimes with results less than desired.  And -- in the case of The Adventures of Dr. Fu Manchu -- with a distinct and disappointing thud.

Hopes were high for the television show.  In 1955, Republic Pictures (yeah, the Poverty Row film company...so maybe hopes weren't that high) paid four million dollars to Sax Rohmer and announced they would produce 78 episodes of the projected series.  In the vaunted Hollywood tradition of placing white guys in oriental roles, Fu Manchu would be played by Glen Gordon, who played uncredited roles in You're in the Navy Now, Bright Victory, and Cell 2455, Death Row, as well as individual supporting roles in two dozen television shows, mainly in the 1950s and early 60s.  Needless to say, Gordon was not a blazing star with an energetic screen persona.  Disagreements between Rohmer and the producers led to a lawsuit, which led to the series being cancelled after filming only 13 episodes.  Less than generous critics may have viewed this kerfuffle as the universe righting itself.

Also attached to the program were Lester Matthews (The Invisible Man's Revenge, The Son of Dr. Jekyll, Jungle Jim in the Forbidden Land, and a host of minor roles covering 216 IMDb credits) as Sir Dennis Nayland Smith, Fu Manchu's sterling British nemesis.  Clark Howat (he had an uncredited role as a patron in Macy's lunchroom in Miracle on 34th Street, had his scenes deleted as a disc jockey in 'Round My Shoulder, was an uncredited soldier in The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, and had a gazillion minor, walk-on, and uncredited roles in his 164 IMDb credits) as Nayland Smith's assistant Dr. John Petrie.  Rounding out the regular cast was Laurette Luez (Prehistoric Women, Siren of Bagdad, Jungle Gents -- her brief career basically ended with The Adventures of Dr. Fu Manchu following her marriage to her third husband; she had two uncredited roles in 1961, a small movie part and one episode of Ben Casey in 1964; she claimed to have been the one to suggest Marilyn Monroe as a stage name for Norma Jean Baker) as Karamenah, Fu Manchu's eye candy assistant with a two-piece outfit -- G-r-r-r.

So the cast was lest than outstanding.  The sets and the production values were even less than worthy of Republic.  The entire program was basically one big plod.  It was so bad it was camp -- or, at least, could be considered considered camp some years down the road.

"The Master Plan of Fu Manchu" was the eleventh episode of the series, directed by William Whitney and scripted by Arthur E. Orloff.  Fu Manchu has kidnapped a famous plastic surgeon to operate on a mysterious "Mr. X" (Steven Geray).  Why?  That is the question facing Nayland Smith.  the clumsily telegraphed twist is that "X" is actually Adolph Hitler, who did not die in the Berlin Fuhrerbunker in 1945.  Fu Manchu plots to use Hitler to conquer the world.

Ask me if I regret spoiling the ending for you.  I don't.

It's only 26 minutes, 26 seconds out of your life:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwSpPWeqRvk

MARGARET WHITING (1924-2011)

Today marks the 100th birthday of popular singer Margaret Whiting.  she came to music naturally -- her father was the composer of such songs as "Hooray for Hollywood," "On the Good Ship Lollipop," and "Ain't We Got Fun?"; her sister and her aunt were both recorded singers.  At age seven, Margaret performed for Johnny Mercer, who later signed her as one of Capitol Records first recording artists.  She was the featured singer in a number of orchestra, including Billy Butterfield's Orchestra and Paul Weston and His Orchestra.  in 1945, she began recording under her own name, accumulating a pile of hits.  She was dubbed "The Queen of the Jukebox."  Margaret and her sister Barbara starred as themselves in the television sitcom Those Whiting Girls (1955-1957).  She was a popular guest star on television through the 1970s.  Her fourth and final husband was a former gay pornography star whom she married when she was 70 and he was 48; they were married for 15 years until his death.  She died at age 86 from natural causes.

"Moonlight in Vermont"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dRw_F3f7ZA

"That Old Black Magic"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93gaxEyNT6o

"It Might As Well Be Spring" (with The Paul Weston Orchestra)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lU_wnHUw-A

"A Tree in the Meadow"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7zn1r_bvaU

"Slipping Around" (with jimmy Wakely)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ilLmVZ9awU

"All Through the Day"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qqt2QZyydGo

"In Love in Vain"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOJf50iXovQ

"Guilty"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_UNuiqOX7o

"Pretending"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxr0lU-UIXo

"Oh, But I Do"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGs69zpUYLA

"Baby It's Cold Outside" (with Johnny Mercer}

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTNheCEUP_A

"Blind Date" (with Bob Hope)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UFn_2PSMmk

"far Away Places"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DO_jUeYdnuw

"Silver Bells" (with Jimmy Wakely)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qkc6xFJC1lU

"The Wheel of Hurt"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_d4TQ_7KXY

"My Foolish Heart"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXRwPxyL3-w

"Till We Meet Again"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLlJmSOMP1s

HYMN TIME

 Hank Williams.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyiGHFGCf2U

OKAIE, MASTER OF THE JUNGLE (DECEMBER-ISH 1945

 Thousands of years' [sic] in the days of the great reptiles, there existed a race of people known as the Terraboolies.  The centre of this empire was at Terr. These warlike people were ruled by a king named Naisagood, whose armies were forever terrorizing the neighbouring countries. [sic]  Con quering [sic] and enslaving them [.]  The time came when a section of Naisagood's army. [sic] which disliked him, decided to revolt.  They planned that in the event of war, those of the army who are discontented, should revolt and desert to the enemy.

The basic thing we have to unpack here is that proofreaders in 1945 Australia were in short supply.  

Okaie, Master of the Jungle was printed by the Offset Publishing Company and contained three stories, the first of which featured Okaie.  The remaining two stories featured Jimmy Weston, Ace animal Cameraman and The Outlaws.  Okaie was the only character to have any further adventures -- which is just as well, since the story ends mid-stream.  Okaie and The Outlaws were both created by Geoff Litchfield, a commercial artist who worked mainly in animated advertising and the theatre, Litchfield, who sign the Okaie story as "Golly" and The Outlaws as "Gosh," would draw only two other Okaie stories.  

The artist for Jimmy Weston was Len Lawson (1927-2003), a best-selling comic book artist who created The Lone Avenger, Diana, Queen of the Apes, and the Hooded Rider.  Lawson comic book career essentially ended in 1954 when he took five models for a remote photo shoot, bound them, sexually assaulted them and raped two.   He was sentenced to death, but the sentence was commuted to 14 years once Australia ended the death penalty; Lawson had asked to continued writing The Lone Avenger, but the publisher wisely refused.  Lawson was released from prison in 1961 after serving half his sentence.  The following year, he assaulted and killed a 16-year-old girl, then took several hostages at a girls grammar school, killing one 15-year-old girl.  For this he was sentenced to life in prison, where he attacked a female member of a dance group for inmates; the woman was severely traumatized and ended killing herself six years later.  Lawson died in prison, certainly none too soon.

AUSTRALIA...WHERE IF NATURE DOESN'T KILL YOU, THE COMIC BOOK ARTISTS MAY.

Anyway, back to Okaie.  He's one of those who is revolting against the king.  Word of the rebellion gets to Prince Karrakar of of the Wiebakkie, who decides to consult the jungle witch doctor -- the High Priest of Terr -- who, in turn, decides to employ magic.  (This is all done in a very vague and confusing manner.)  Okaie rides a zebra into battle, with the rebel army riding brontosaurs.  Did I mention that Okaie has enlisted the help of the ape men?  If can follow the plot threads and the l;ack of logic, you're a better person than I am.  The artwork is pretty nifty in areas, though.

Jimmy Weston has a pencil-thin mustache and wears a pith helmet.  Working for the Australian Imperial Film Corp., he is in Africa to get some special shots for an upcoming film.  With him is Doc Harvey, a jungle explorer, and Betty Winthrop, Jimmy's pretty new assistant.  A lion sneaks into camp and attacks Doc but Jimmy shoots it in the nick of time.  The next day, Jimmy and Betty see a giant ape being crushed by a huge python.  Since jimmy doesn't like snakes, he shoots the python,  the ape is grateful and motion Jimmy and the group to follow him into the jungle, where -- after Jimmy is almost devoured by a crocodile -- the ape leads Jimmy to the cave city of his tribe and show him a treasure of gold and gems.  Well, hot doggies!  That treasure sure can do some good for people in need.  However, a German (this is just after WWII, remember) guide decides to get the treasure for himself.  The German makes the mistake of pointing a gun at Jimmy, who is now the giant ape's best friend...  Some pretty nifty artwork from a not-so-nifty artist.

As the result of a temporary breakdown of social life which followed the Second World War, outlaws have become. [sic] active on a large scale:  [sic] and well organized.   In the farming districts of the great Out-back, certain progressive elements of society have organized themselves into peoples committees to deal with the menace.  "Jack the Officer" has been appointed chief of the secret police, and is hard on the trail of the "Kellymen", a small gang of whom, have slipped away, after a futile attempt has been made to bomb them in their hide-out on the river.

In the meantime, Sheriff Joe Donz is shot and killed and Jack the Officer is tasked with finding the killer...

This story is not quite as confusing as Okaie's, and the artwork is acceptable.

Throw a shrimp on the barbie and settle down to enjoy:   https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=90864&comicpage=&b=i

FORGOTTEN BOOK: JOE GOLEM AND THE DROWNING CITY

 Joe Golem and the Drowning City by Mike Mignola and Christopher Golden  (2012)

In an alternate timeline, Lower Manhattan was devastated in 1925 by an earthquake and the rising ocean.  Now New York City is divided into two parts:  The Lower end, inundated by water rising to almost three stories, and the Upper end, which survived the catastrophe and whose residents enjoy a plush and sybaritic lifestyle.  Those who survive in the Drowning City eke out a desperate living and are often prey to others.  The rising waters have also brought forth a steampunk age, filled with sorcery, magic, and supernatural happenings.

Fast forward many years. Felix Orlov the Conjurer, now incredibly old, makes his living by offering seances.  The seances are, more often than not, the real thing for Felix can actually communicate with the dead.  His assistant is Molly, a fourteen-year-old waif whom he had rescued two years before.  Felix has provided the one safe haven that Molly ever knew and she loves him like a father.  Then one day, during a seance with the Mendehlsons in which he was trying to reach their con David, Felix froze and became spasmatic; he began chanting with a phlegmy laugh, his skin began to hiss and wispy smoke came out of his body.  And then it began to get really creepy.  Suddenly the door to the room burst open.  Metal canisters were hurled onto the floor, releasing some sort of gas. Strange men in wetsuits and buglike gas masks entered.  One twisted Mrs. Mendehlson's head, snapping the bone.  Molly could not see what happened to the woman's husband, but she knew that he had been killed.  Felix shoved Molly toward safety, and she ran, pursued by one of the "gasmen."  The others took Felix with them and left.  Molly knew her way around the Drowned City from her days when she lived on the street.  she ran and dodged and tried to hide, but the gasman just kept coming for her.  Then a huge man -- a complete stranger -- appeared before her and spoke her name.  The man said his name was Joe and he placed himself between Molly and the charging gasman.  Joe's strength was enormous, and as powerful as the gas man was, he was no match for Joe, who tore the gasman's wetsuit, releasing...something.  The suit deflated and there remained only something small moving inside of it.  Joe tore the gasman's arm off.  Something escaped form the suit and slid into the water.

Molly had no idea what was going on but she knew that she could trust this giant, Joe.  Joe brought her to meet Simon Church, and elderly detective from the turn of the Twentieth Century, kept alive by various mechanical devices grafted to his body.  Church was a world-famous detective whose exploits published in the magazines of the day made him a world-renown character, like Sherlock Holmes.  Like Holmes, many thought Simon Church was fictional.  Over the years, Church had had many assistants, all of whom were now dead; the one exception was a man who had sacrificed himself in an occult manner to save Church -- that assistant vanished from the Earth, neither living or dead, doomed to spend eternity in nowhere.  For the past twenty years, Church's assistant has been Joe.

Joe remembers nothing of his life before hooking up with Church, although Joe sometimes has dreams of a time centuries ago in Poland, where Joe was a creature of stone, hunting and killing witches who preyed on the village folk.  Joe, it turns out, is a golem, whose long years of service has been rewarded by being turned into a flesh and blood man.

The ones who have captured Felix and tried to catch Molly turn out to be acolytes of Dr. Cocteau, Church's old nemesis, and a man steeped in arcane lore.  Felix, it turns out is the key to finding an powerful occult object known a Lector's Pentajulum.  The problem is no one knows exactly what the Pentajulum does or how it works, only that it is the most powerful and dangerous object in the world.  Cocteau wants the Pentajulum because he believes he can use it to open an interdimensional gateway to bring the Old Ones to Earth.  Church must stop Cocteau at any cost.  To do this, he must locate where Cocteau has brought Felix, so Molly and Joe go out on a quest...a quest that will bring them face to face with unimaginable horrors and death to many, a quest that will eventually result in the destruction of the rest of New York City, and that may mean the end of all life on Earth...

Ghosts and golems and changelings and monsters, oh my!  Mignola and Golden spin a marvelous tale of a strange and forbidden city during a strange and forbidden time.  A tale of heroism and valor and of bloody deeds.

Mike Mignola may be best known  for his comic book work and for creating Hellboy, the B.P. R.D. series, Abe Sapian, and Lobster Johnson.  For this extravaganza, he has created more than 65 woodcuts that mesh perfectly with the story.  Christopher Golden is the best-selling author of the Shadows saga, the Body of Evidence series, the Ghosts of Albion series (with Amber Benson), the Ben Walker series, the Hidden Cities series (with Tim Lebbon), the Menagerie series (with Thomas E. Sniegnoski), the Prowlers series, the Bloodstained Oz series (with James A. Moore), the Hollow series (with Ford Lytle Gilmore), and the Secret Journeys of Jack London series (with Lebbon), along with many other books.  Golden is also a noted tie-writer and has written extensively in the Marvel Universe, the Hellboy Universe, the Buffyverse, among others.  Golden is also a comic book writer and a frequent anthologist.  Mignoli and Golden wrote an earlier Joe Golem adventure, Joe Golem and the Copper Girl. 

ARCHIE ANDREWS: MR. ANDREWS WALLPAPERS A ROOM (JULY 17, 1948)

Everyone's favorite orange-haired teenager, Archie Andrews, began his radio career on May 31, 1943 on the NBC Blue Network.  The show shifted to the Mutual Network in 1944, and them to NBC Radio in 1945, where it stayed until September 5, 1953.  Archie was played by Charles Mullen (1943-44), Jack Grimes (1944), Burl Boyer (1945), and Bob Hastings (1945-1953).  Jughead was played by Hal Stone, Cameron Andrews, and Arnold Stang.  During the NBC radio run Rosemary Rice played Betty, Gloria Mann played Veronica, Alice Yourman played Archie's mother, and Art Kohl played Archie's father..  The show, of course was based on Bob Montana's comic book character, created by Montana, MLJ Comics publisher John L. Goldwater, and writer Vic Bloom; Archie first appeared in Pep Comics #22 (December 1941).  Goldwater wanted to create a character who would appeal to fans of the Mickey Rooney Andy Hardy character. Montana based many of the characters in the Archie universe on former high school friends from Haverhill, Massachusetts.

Travel with us to Riverdale, where times were much simpler and the most complicated issue was the eternal question:  Betty or Veronica?  (A question, by the way, that has never been answered.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvM2fdGeO7s

SHORT STORY WEDNESDAY: THE VILLAGE OF THE DEVIL-DEVIL DRUMS, PLUS A MURRAY LEINSTER COLLECTION I PROBABLY WILL NEVER READ

 "The Village of the Devil-Devil Drums" by "Murray Leinster" (Will F. Jenkins)  (first published in Danger Trails, June 1928; reprinted in Leinster's Guns for Achin, 1936; in Adventure Novels and Short Stories, as Will F. Jenkins, January 1938; and in Leinster's The Trail of Blood and Other Tales of Adventure, 2017)

Guns for Achin by Murray Leinster (London:  Wright & Brown, 1936)

The island of Sualaha in the Solomons is not a safe place for any man, white or black, where any person from another village is considered fair game for the native headhunters.  Nor is it a safe place for a woman because females are considered unimportant.  Young Ntuvi had had a bit more freedom than other women, being the daughter of a former village chief; perhaps that gave her ideas she should not have had.  When the most powerful and most holy man in the village, the devil-devil doctor Old Baruti, tried to become amorous with Ntuvi, she threw a pot at him in disgust, splattering the man with food and, worse, hurting his pride.  Ntuvi fled into the jungle, knowing that Baruti would have her tortured and killed for such a blasphemous offence.  Baruti began beating on the devil;-devil drums, alerting his village to find the girl and bring her to him for punishment.  Even Kavo, the boy who wanted desperately to become a warrior and who had feeling for the lithesome Ntuvi, was afraid to go against Baruti's wrath.

Meanwhile, a wounded white man is crawling through the jungle, being chased by more than a dozen warriors from the other side of the island.  We are not given this man's name because it does not matter; all that matter's is that he has a white man's head -- something that is worth ten times more than a Black man's on this island.  He and two shipmates come ashore from s schooner where they had been attacked without warning by natives.  The white man escaped; his comrades were slaughtered; and now a large group of native are in pursuit.  The path through the jungle is dangerous.  There are traps -- lethal poisons, arrow and spear traps, deep pits filled with spears -- throughout the jungle.  the white man has proceed carefully, avoiding the main jungle paths.  His pursuers hope yo capture him -- and his head -- before he reaches the other side of the island, where they fear attack from Baruti's people, who would happily take their heads.  On the far side of the island, the white man hopes to find a dugout which he (hopefully) would be able to get out to sea away from the range of the native sling guns.  From there, he could sail to his heavily armed and guarded schooner -- and safety.

Then the white man stumbles on Ntuvi, who is shocked by his appearance.  Is she a danger?  will she reveal his whereabouts?  He hesitates to kill her, fearing noise will bring those who have been relentlessly chasing him.  He realizes that she, too, is on the run.  Before he can decide what to do, another figure approaches.  It is Kavo, whose feelings for Ntuvi overcame his fear.  But thoughts of Ntuvi vanish when he sees the white man.  Here is his chance to become a great and wealthy warrior; all he needs to do is to kill the white man and take his head.  As Kavo raises his spear, the white man knocks him out with a single punch.

What can the white man do?  Baruti now has over four dozen warriors nearing from the village.  Meanwhile, the natives chasing him are very close.  The unconscious Kavo will surely attack him when he regains consciousness.   If he uses his gun on Kavo, it will alert all the natives to his location.  His hope for reaching the shore and an unattended dugout has vanished.  He only has a few bullets left in his revolver...

All I can say is never underestimate the abilities of a Leinster hero.

A well-plotted, tense story with a vivid background and location from a master.

__________

Guns for Achin was Leinster's first short story collection, published only in England in 1936.  WorldCat lists no American libraries owning the book, and only five copies available worldwide -- in Ireland, Scotland, and England.  No copies are available on Abebooks, or on eBay, or is it listed on Amazon.  It is not available from the usual online sources.  It appears to be completely out of my reach unless some enterprising publisher decides to reissue it -- something that I find unlikely to happen.

Guns for Achin contains nine stories, some of which are readily available for today's reader:

• Kuantan, Klit (I believe this to be a retitling of the short story "Kuantan," which was first published in Adventure, February 15, 1928; reprinted in the British magazine Empire Frontier, December 1929; and in Adventure Novels and Short Stories, April 1939.  There is a possibility thi8s is the story "Khilit," first published in Everybody's, March 1929; reprinted in Short Stories {UK edition}, mid-May 1930; reprinted in Smashing Novels Magazine, September 1936.  there is also the possibility that this is neither of those stories.)
• The Eye of Black A'Wang (This is the first of three stories featuring adventurer Malay Collins; first published in Short Stories, January 10, 1930; reprinted in Short Stories [UK edition}, mid-August 1930; reprinted in Adventure Novels Magazine, February 1937 as by Will Jenkins; reprinted in Short Stories, September 1951; included in the Black Dog Press chapbook Malay Collins:  Master Thief of the East, 2000; reprinted in High Adventure #110, January, 2010.  the September 1951 issue of Short Stories can be read at Internet Archive.)
• The Emerald Buddha (the second of the three Malay Collins stories; first published in Short Stories, February 19, 1930; reprinted in Short Stories [UK edition], mid-June 1930; reprinted in Adventure Yarns, October 1938, as by Will F. Jenkins; included in the Black Dog Press chapbook Malay Collins:  Master Thief of the East, 2000; reprinted in High Adventure #110, January 2010.)
• The Black Sone of Agharti (The last of the three Malay Collins stories.  First published in Short Stories, September 10, 1930. reprinted in Empire Frontier, January 1931; reprinted in Adventure Yarns, August 1938, as by Will F. Jenkins; included in the Black Dog Press chapbook Malay Collins:  Master Thief of the East, 2000; included in High Adventure January 2015.)
• Payung (first published in Everybody's, September 1928; reprinted in Empire Frontiers, June 1930; reprinted in The Trail of Blood and Other Tales of Adventure, 2017))
• The Dream of Sungi Gut (I can find no indication of a previous appearance.)
• Guns for Achin (from Smashing Novels Magazine, December 1936, as by Will Jenkins.)
• Tuilagi (First published in The Danger Trail, April 1927; reprinted in The Trail of Blood and Other Tales of Adventure, 2017.)
• The Village of the Devil Drums (first published in The Danger Trail, Jun 1928; reprinted in Adventure Novels and Short Stories, January 1938, as by Will F. Jenkins; reprinted in Trail of Blood and Other Tales of Adventure, 2017.)

Any further information, clarifications, or corrections will be greatly appreciated.

Jenkins/Leinster was a master of the exotic adventure story.  One can only hope that many of these stories will eventually become available online.

OVERLOOKED FILM: GIRL GANG (1954)

 As one commenter remarked, "This makes Ed Wood look like Orson Welles."

Gang leader Joe (Timothy Farrell, Glen or Glenda, Paris After Midnight, Test Tube Babies} has assembled a group of young people -- mostly girls women, er, thirty-year-old teenagers, actually -- to commit various crimes ranging from robbery to grand theft auto to prostitution for him.  How does he do it? Simple.  He gets them hooked on drugs; first marijuana, then heroin.  These kids will do anything for their fix.  Joe insists that they use no violence while committing their crimes, but are drug-aadles kids capable of listening to him?

This is a bottom of the barrel exploitation flick.  One bright spot, if it could be called that, is the presence of Jo Ann Arnold -- Playboy's Playmate of the Month, June 1954 -- as June; her films include Invasion of the Star Creatures, Daddy-o, and The Diary of a High School Bride.  Other actresses include Mary Lou O'Connor (her only IMDb credit), Mildred Kalke (her only IMDb credit), Thelma Montgomery (her only IMDb credit), Marie Metier (her only IMDb credit), Irene Gilmore (her only IMDb credit), and Peggy Winters (her only IMDb credit).  Does anyone else notice a trend here?

File this one under So Bad It's Gotta Be Entertaining.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qteAJcHcE0k

BITS & PIECES

EDITORIAL:  This seems appropriate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lj9KVSB5Ii0

**********

Openers:  Joe Lang, squatting on his heels by the small fire with the tin cup of coffee in his hands, tensed as the sound reached him through the darkness.  Swiftly, but with a smoothness that made the motion seem unhurried, he set the cup on the ground, reached for his carbine and cocked it,  He turned his head to squint into the blackness beyond beyond the glow of the small, lingering flames, his lean, strong-boned, weathered face wary. 

The sound came again, more distinctly, nearer.  A single gorse, approaching through the night at a walk,  Catlike, Joe Lang's tall, powerful figure rose from the ground and faded back into the darkness enclosing the small pocket of firelight.  He waited, the barrel of his carbine resting in the crook of his left elbow, his right forefinger just touching the trigger guard.  This part of Montana was full of mining activity.  Riding down to Beaver Head V alley earlier, Lang had spotted a number of miners' shacks and mineshafts along the new, isolated little farms springing up.  and wherever there was gold, there's be the men who came to prey on those who struck it. 

The sound of the horse's hoofs stopped abruptly in the blackness on the other side of the cookfire.  Lang's two horses, tethered to graze on the fringe of the firelight, raised their heads in that direction, nostrils flaring as they caught the scent.

Land shifted sideways, began circling the fire soundlessly.  As he neared the other side of the fire, he swung deeper into the darkness.  When  he judged he had reached the right place, he swung back toward the fire.  The carbine was ready in his taut hands.  Crouching, he moved in till he could see the dark shape of a horse and rider silhouetted against the stars.

Lang spoke softly to the mounted man's back, "Move on into the light."

-- Rider from Wind River by Marvin Albert (1959)

Lang's caution was justified.  The stranger managed to pull a gu on him and take his two horse, leaving behind the stolen one he had come in with.  The stolen horse that Lang was left with had belonged to a miner who was killed for a bag of gold nuggets, and now Lang is accused of the murder.  The real murderer was Ed Stone, of the Stone gang, one of the most vicious, bloodthirsty gangs in the West.  To save himself, Lang must go after Ed Stone.

Marvin H. Albert was a prolific writer -- usually of paperbacks -- of mystery, crime, western, and adventure novels, and of many film novelizations. He was noted for his mystery novels featuring ex-pat Pete Sawyer.  His 1975 suspense thriller The Gargoyle Conspiracy was nominated for an Edgar Award.  He also used the pseudonyms Al (or Albert) Conroy, Ian McAlister, Nick Quarry, J. D. Christilion, and Anthony Rome.  At least eleven of his novels were adapted as films, including The Law and Jake Wade, Dual at Diablo, Bullet for a Badman, Rough Night in Jericho, Tony Rome, and Lady in Cement.  Albert was one of those rare authors who could always be counted on as being entertaining.

Incoming:

• Mike Ashley, King Arthur.  Nonfiction.  "The story of Arthur, Camelot, and the Knights of the Round Table has been handed on by medieval poets and mythical stories -- but what f he did indeed reign as a great king in the early years of Britain's story?  If so, who was he?  And what do the historical documents tell us about him?  This lively brief history re-examines the source material and finds clear evidence that the Arthurian legends arose from the exploits of at least three men, originating in Wales, Scotland, and Brittany.  Historian Mike Ashley, author of the best-selling Brief History of British Kings and Queens, establishes that the rue historical Arthur did exist, and is distantly related to the British royal family.  Ashley's fascinating account provides unexpected, detailed insight into an otherwise mythical figure, often dismissed as a chivalric fantasy.  Protector, war lord, legend -- the true history of King Arthur is more revealing than the fables."  Ashley is also a well-known editor; among his compilations are The Pendragon Chronicles, The Camelot Chronicles, The Merlin Chronicles, The Chronicles of the Holy Grail, The Chronicles of the Round Table, The Mammoth Book pf Arthurian Legends, and The Mammoth Book of King Arthur.
• Robert Michael "Bobb" Cotter, A History of the Doc Savage Adventures in Pulps, Paperbacks, Comics, Fanzines, Radio and Film.  Blame George the Tempter for this one.  "The adventure series is examined in relation to historical events and the changing tastes of readers, with special attention paid to the horror and science fiction elements.  The artwork features illustrations, covers, and original art.  Chapters cover Doc Savage paperbacks, pulp magazines, comic books, and fanzines, and an appendix offers biographies of all major contributors to the series."  Cotter was the author of The Mexican Masked Wrestler and Monster Filmography, Caroline Munro, First Lady of Fantasy:  A Complete Annotated Record of Film and Television Appearances, Ingrid Pitt, Queen of Horror:  The Complete Career, and The great Monster Magazines:  A Critical Study of the Black and White Publications of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s.
• Greg Cox, Countdown.  Tie-in novel to the Dc Comics series.  "Cosmic legend has it that when the primordial gods of antiquity perished in some bygone cataclysm, the universe gave birth to a new breed of gods who reigned from two eternally warring worlds. the heavenly New Genesis and the hellish Apokolips.  Now a vast conspiracy of evil is determined to eradicate the New Gods and steal their souls to obtain universal power that can destroy all of reality.  Jimmy Olsen, Superman's pal and redheaded photographer for the Daily Planet, exhibits powers of his own and, with them, has the opportunity to become a hero,  Meanwhile, Mary Marvel awakens from a coma to discover that she's been abandoned by her family and friends -- and her magical ability to wield the thunderbolt.  Donna Troy, Jason Todd, and Holly Robinson, once super heroes, were forced to retire and rejoin the ranks of humanity.  until the Earth calls upon Wonder Girl, Robin, and Catwoman once more to prevent a crisis beyond all imagination.  At the end of an age where time, space, and reality may bow before unseen forces, the fate of the Earth lies in the hands of five unlikely super heroes who have one destiny to fulfill:  save the world at all costs..."   DC Comics has changed since I was a kid.
• [Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine], July/August 2023.  Cost me a quarter at a thrift table.  Among the authors are Brendan DuBois, John M. Floyd, Michael Z. Lewin, Marilyn Todd, Dave Zeltserman, and Peter Turnbull, plus a newly translated story from Marcel Ayme.  How can you go wrong?
• Richard Kadrey, Kill City Blues.  A sandman Slim novel, the fifth in the series.  "James Stark, aka Sandman Slim, has managed to get out of Hell, renounce his title as the new Lucifer, and settle back into life in L.A.  But he also lost the Qomrama Om Ya, an all-powerful weapon from the banished older gods.  Older gods who are returning and searching for their lost power.  The hunt leads Stark to an abandoned shopping mall -- a global shipping paradise infested with Lurkers and wretched bottom-feeding Sub Rosa families, squatters who have formed tight tribes to guard their tiny patches of retail wasteland.  Somewhere in this kill zone is a dead man with the answers Stark needs.  All Stark has to do is find the dead man, recover the artifact,  and outwit and outrun the angry old gods -- and natural-born killers -- on his tail.  But not even Sandman Slim  is infallible, and any mistakes will cost him dearly."
• Joe R. Lansdale, Blood in the Gears, Cosmic Interruptions, and Gothic Wounds.  Three major retrospective collections from hisownself.  Blood in the Gears contains 26 crime suspense, and mystery stories; Cosmic Interruptions has 28 science fiction. offbeat fantasy, and speculative fiction tales; while Gothic Wounds gives us 20 of Lansdale's special stories of East Texas and other strange places.  Also, Moon Lake, a suspense novel.  "Daniel Russell was only thirteen years old when his father tried to kill them both by driving their /Buick into Moon Lake.  Miraculously surviving the crash, Daniel returns to the site of this traumatic incident in the hopes of recovering his father's car and remains.  But as he attempts to finally pout to rest the memories that have plagued him for years, Daniel discovers inconsistencies amid the Buick's wreckage, minor at first, and them utterly shocking.  Still reeling, he diligently follows where the mysterious trail leads, colliding head-on with a twisted web of small-town politics in the process,  And he'll need to untangle himself if he has any hope of learning the truth.  With the help of his old flame, Ronnie -- the only Black woman police officer intown and the best person to navigate the town's complicated power imbalances and racial dynamics -- Daniel gains access to their hometown's secret history, each sordid detail more surprising than the last.  As the two grapple with the consequences of their findings, they unveil the grimmest revelation of them all."
• Billee J. Stallings & Jo-An J. Evans, Murray Leinster:  The Life and Works.  A biography/memoir/appreciation of the prolific pulp writer and novelist, written by his two youngest daughters.   Leinster fans (such as I) will be grateful for this inside look.
• Charles Stross, The Apocalypse Codex and The Annihilation Score.  Two more cases for the Laundry Files, the fourth and sixth in the series, respectively.  First, "for outstanding heroism in the field (despite himself) computational demonologist Bob Howard is on the fast track for promotion to management within the Laundry, the supersecret British government agency tasked with defending the realm from occult threats.  Assigned to External Assets, Bob discovers the company (unofficially) employs freelance agents to deal with sensitive situations that may embarrass Queen and Country.  So when Ray schiller -- an American televangelist with the uncanny ability to miraculously heal the ill -- becomes uncomfortably close to the Prime Minister. External Assets dispatches the brilliant, beautiful, and extremely unpredictable Persephone Hazard to infiltrate the Golden Promise Ministries and discover why the preacher is so interested in British politics.  And it's Bob's job to make sure Persephone doesn't cause an international incident.  But it's a supernatural incident that Bob needs to worry about -- a global threat that even the Laundry my be unable to clean up..."  Then, in Annihilation, "Dominique O'Brien -- her friends call her Mo -- lives a curious double life with her husband, Bob Howard.  To the average civilian, they're boring middle-aged civil servants.  But within the labyrinthine secret circles of Her Majesty's Government, they're operatives for the nation's occult security service known as the Laundry, charged with defending Britain against dark supernatural forces threatening humanity.  Unfortunately, one of those supernatural threats has come between Mo and Bob.  An antique violin, and Erich Zahn original, made of white human bone, was designed to produce music capable of slaughtering demons.  Mo is the custodian of this unholy instrument.  It invades her dreams and yearn for the blood of her colleagues -- and he husband.  And despite Mo's proficiency as a world-class violinist, it cannot be controlled..."  This series cleverly combines Lovecraftian lore with spy-guy fantasy action.

The Anti-Climax:  Will F. Jenkins (a.k.a. Murray Leinster, began his writing career in 1915 with short pieces and poems published in The Smart Set, some of which were published as by "Jean Farquar."  Despite it's brevity, "The Anti-Climax" can be viewed as a novel in just six paragraphs.  this was Jenkins's seventh published piece and it's a wickedly sly one.

(Apropos of nothing, my wife often remarked that the name Kitty was used only to reference a harlot with a heart of gold, or the upstairs maid.  This tale proves that she was wrong.)

THE ANTI-CLIMAX

by Will F. Jenkiins

(from The Smart Set, July 1916)

Johnny is the sort of person who does physical culture exercises before he goes to bed.  Kitty is the sort of person you find being interviewed for newspaper and magazines by sob-sisters and elderly maiden ladies with Victorian sentimentality and very slight penetration.  She has a genius for a press-agent.  His name, by the way, was Bill.  She was known to the public because of the fact that she was one of the most accomplished snifflers on the American stage and from the efforts of the press-agent aforesaid.

How Johnny met her is immaterial.  He considered her interesting however, because she was doubtful how to talk to him and hit on the subject of woman suffrage.  Johnny was opposed to woman suffrage, but thought women should be interested in such things, and promptly asked if he might call to talk it over.  He was no gilded youth, though he had the gilt, and she said he might.  Kitty's interest in suffrage had led her to read two magazine articles on it and announce her conversion to the cause.  It was good for three interviews.  When Johnny did call, he had a small volume of Rabindranath Tagore in his pocket, and during the afternoon he read to her from the poem beginning, "On the slope of the desolate river among the tall grasses. ***" and so on.  It is a beautiful thing and Johnny read it well.  When he finished she strangled her fifth yawn just in time.  During the afternoon he also read her a n umber of other poems.

I decline to attempt to write a love story, and therefore I shall carefully omit an analysis of the motives which prompted her to make Johnny fall in love with her.  I shall also not describe the means.  But fall in love with her he did, and thoroughly.  He had been in love with her for quite three weeks before she remarked that as soon as her husband got his decree she intended to marry Bill, her press-agent.  The Johnny identified her with the dubious Kitty Malone, whose matrimonial and other adventures were beloved of small-town sports, revivalists, and magazine section editors.  Before, he had idealized her unmercifully and had quite decided to marry her.  But now -- Marriage with Kitty was really out of the question for him.  He had always had an abhorrence for second-hand objects, and Kitty had already had four husbands, and apparently contemplated a fifth.

He took it very much to heart.  For a while he meditated upon the dramatic charm of permitting the experience to embitter him, and becoming thenceforth a cynic.  Had he dined decently the night before and his mental attitude that morning been one of irritati0on, this is undoubtedly what would have happened.  But Johnny, like most stupid folk, was very virtuous, and had dine not well but too wisely.  The penalty of his virtue was an excellent appetite which he had sated with waffles.  Some day an enterprising psychologist will prepare a brochure upon the effect of foods on the emotions.  Not having the leisure to discuss this at length, I merely pause to point out that waffles, eaten in sufficient quantities, produce a mental attitude of noble, gentle, melancholy.  There are two sorts of melancholy.  Johnny's fastened upon his convictions and he decided that the world held nothing more for him.  Believing firmly in a future life and having incompletely having digested the waffles, he determined upon suicide.  He made his plans with care.  He had no immediate family and his business affairs were at the time under his control, and would consequently not be affected by his untimely demise, so he prepared for euthanasia.  He arranged an elaborate story and went to a drug-store to buy cyanide.  To his relief, a preparation was sold him without question.  He returned to his rooms, poured out a stiff dose, and copied out in a fair hand the Tagore poem, "I have got my leave, Bid me farewell, my brothers.  I bow to you and take my leave, **"  He sat beside the telephone, swallowed the concoction, and called up Kitty.

To my great regret I am unable to relate the conversation.  From Johnny I can learn nothing, while Kitty will not bear that subject be mentioned.  All that can be definitely said is that Kitty made him ring off, called up four newspapers, announced that she was prostrated with grief over the death of her admirer, wo had expired at her feet, swearing he could not live without her love, and the arranged for six new gowns of very subdued design.

Really, it was very careless of Johnny.  Her beautiful publicity campaign was spoiled, her six gowns rendered utterly useless, and a properly melodramatic finish to this story prevented by his lack of care.  He hung up the 'phone, leaned back in his chair, and lit a cigarette.  He felt himself turning pale, and cold sweat upon his brow.  He felt slightly ill.  He glanced at the bottle from which he had taken his fatal drink, and them he realized; that with his farewell written, Kitty's picture by his side and the evening papers notified; that he was not going to die.  The bottle was not labeled cyanide -- it was labeled germicide.  He examined hi symptoms and new what he was going to do.  He was going to be seasick.

Nobody Expects the Spanish Inquisition:  At least not after July 15, 1834 when the Spanish Inquisition was officially disbanded after nearly 356 years.  Sorry, Monty Python.

Rosetta:  Today marks the 225th anniversary of the discovery of the Rosetta Stone.  The Rosetta Stone is a stele inscribed with three versions of a decree issued in 196 BC on behalf of King Ptolemy IV Euphrates of Egypt.  The decree is issued ion three languages:  Ancient Egyptian using hieroglyphic scripts, Ancient Egyptian using Demotic Scripts (a form of "document" writing that was used increasingly during this period for literary and religious texts; it was considered to be a higher class of writing), and Ancient Greek. The stone eventually led scholars to be able to read and translate the Ancient Egyptian texts.

The Rosetta Stone was most likely first displayed in a temple, possibly in Sais, a city in the Western Nile Delta.  It was probably then moved before or during the Mamluk period (1250-1517), and eventually was used as material by the Mamluks in the construction of Fort Julien near the town of Rashid (Rosetta) in the Nile Valley (around 1470, or perhaps during renovations in 1516).  The fort had fallen into disrepair by July 1799 when the French took possession it.  While working to repair the fort's defenses one of Napoleon's aides-de-camp, Lieutenant Pierre-Francois Bouchard, uncovered the stone.

Almost immediately, scholars were eager to use the Stone in an attempt to decipher this previously untranslatable hieroglyphic text.  With the defeat of the French, the British took to Stone to England in 1801, where it has been on display since 1802.  Final translations took a while and there were four major steps over the years:

Fist, recognizing the the Stone offer three versions of the same text (1799).

Second, learning that the Demotic Text used phonetic characters to spell foreign names (1802).

Third, discovering that the hieroglyphic text did so as well, and that it had striking similarities to the Domotic (1814).

Fourth, the realization that phonetic characters were also used to spell native Egyptian words (1822-1324).

In case you are wondering, the decree was meant to establish Ptolemaic rule over Egypt.

The importance of the Rosetta Stone cannot be understated.  It allowed man a glimpse into something that was long thought unobtainable, and the ingenuity used to translate it was remarkable.  Today, the term Rosetta Stone is used to describe anything that can open a door to wider study and knowledge in various fields.  In the end, the Rosetta Stone gives us hope that we can overcome burdensome obstacles on the way to greater knowledge.

 Hi Yo, Silver:   Here's an undated cartoon from the 1930s featuring the Lone Ranger and Tonto.  This may have been the very first Lone Ranger film.

The Lone Ranger and Tonto foil a band of cattle rustlers and save the life of a rancher.  As one commentator noted, after the bad guys surrendered, they were not taken into custody, and the Lone Ranger and Tonto ride off without the cattle.  Hmm.  Perhaps you should suspend your disbelief as you watch this.

https://archive.org/details/1930sLoneRangerCartoon

CelebrateAnd July 15 is also St. Swithin's Day.  Tradition has it that :

• Today is Orange Chicken Day!  To celebrate, here's a recipe for Panda Express-style Chinese orange chicken.  Yum!      https://www.cookinwithmima.com/easy-orange-chicken-recipe/
• Today is also National Tapioca Pudding Day.  Here's a recipe to get you started:      https://www.bing.com/images/searchview=detailv2&iss=sbi&FORM=recidp&sbisrc=ImgDropper&q=tapioca+pudding&imgurl=https://bing.com/thid=OSK.25943ad0327893c1308229df147082c7&idpbck=1&sim=4&pageurl=bd655ce8c4ba2a1c8c7c9dd87436e29d&idpp=recipe&ajaxhist=0&ajaxserp=0  (Yeah, you're going top have to work to pull that one up online.)
• And it's Global Hug Your Kid Day -- presumably you ignore your kid for the rest of the year.
• Not to be outdone, it's Be a Dork Day, in honor, I believe, of those who only hug their kid only today.
• Also, it's National Respect Canada Day,  Celebrate by eating poutine, I guess.
• And July 15 is St. Swithin's Day.  Tradition has it that whatever the weather is like on St. Swithin's Day, it will continue so for the next forty days.  Kind of a scary thought i this age of global warming.

Cowboy Copas:  Today would have been the 11th birthday of Lloyd Estel ("Cowboy") Copas, the legendary country singer who lost his life in the 1963 plane crash that also took Patsy Cline and Hawkshaw Hawkins.  Enjoy some of his songs:

The original "Tennessee Waltz"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XG6tlIqeYc

"A Satisfied Mind"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVE0XyBy0SA

"Sunny Tennessee"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=188eIpFdoUI

"Alabam"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7uPwrKKsGQ

"Filipino Baby"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuYYoQEBkW4

"I'm Hogtied Over You"  with Patsy Cline

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fow1uJltwXs

"Circle Rock"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERTvwslXVrc

"Cope's Wildflower"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvRrcufXsDo

"Candy Kisses"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6x9_itOeCc

"South Pacific Shore"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kP7WKLTIIPc

"Feelin' Low"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_esNDABJ53s

"I Dreamed of a Hillbilly heaven"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIrW5AiODAg

Ha Ha:  A musician once told me he was going to hit me with the neck of his guitar.  "Oh yeah?"  I said, "Is that a fret?"

No Florida Man This Week:  I'm just not in the mood for people doing stupid things, often with guns.

Good News:

• If you build it, they will come.     https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/dad-attracts-diners-from-across-the-globe-after-building-22k-greek-taverna-in-his-backyard/
• The essentials:  WD-20. duct tap[e, and now baking soda.     https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/woman-who-nearly-died-after-bacteria-ate-her-nose-says-baking-soda-saved-her-life/
• Eagles take parenting to heart.      https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/eagle-parents-spend-year-nursing-chick-who-fell-out-of-a-tree-forsaking-the-new-nesting-season/
• The importance of meadowlands.      https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/meadowmaker-flowers-herald-return-of-rare-bumblebee-in-england-after-scenic-meadows-restored/
• An idea whose time has come:  pick up litter and get free stuff.      https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/pick-up-litter-and-get-free-stuff-in-copenhagen-this-summer-through-eco-conscious-rewards-program/
• Rescuing wild  mustangs.     https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/she-rescues-wild-mustangs-rounded-up-across-the-west-and-reunites-their-herds-on-her-ranch/
• Double good luck, and we wish her well.      https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/pennsylvania-lottery-75-year-old-woman-wins-5-million-scratch-off-after-beating-breast-cancer/
• Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!      https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/free-computer-game-based-on-h-p-lovecraft-books-raises-thousands-for-polish-red-cross/

Something to Remember:  "May we think of freedom, not as the right to do as we please, but as the opportunity to do what is right." -- Peter Marshall

Today's Poem:

Baseball's Sad Lexicon

These are the saddest of possible words:

Tinker to Evers to Chance.

Trio of Bear-cubs, fleeter than birds,

Tinker to Evers to Chance.

Ruthlessly pricking our gonfalon bubble,

Making a Giant hit into a double --

:Words that are weighty with nothing but trouble:

Tinkers to Evers to Chance.

-- FPA (Franklin Pierce Adams)

who was a Giants fan

HYMN TIME

 The Statler Brothers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifISVkfMC7s

THE MARK OF ZORRO -- DELL FOUR-COLOR #228 (MAY 1949)

The first-ever Zorro comic book!

Zorro began life in Johnston McCulley's 1919 novel The Curse of Capistrano, first serialized in All-Story Magazine, August 9 through September 6.  The Curse of Capistrano  eventually sold over five million copies, becoming one of the best-selling books of all time.  It was meant to be a one-off but the success of the film adaptation, The Mark of Zorro, the following year with Douglas Fairbanks, led McCulley to write an additional four serialized stories and fifty-seven short stories about the character.  (Fairbanks followed up with Don Q, Son of Zorro (1925), but this was actually based on one of the Don Q novels, Don Q's Love Story (1919), by the mother and son writing team of Kate Pritchard and Hesketh Hesketh-Pritchard; thus, no credit was given to McCulley.)

More than fifty films about Zorro (or, at least with Zorro in the title) have been made, including 1940's classic The Mark of Zorro, with Tyrone Power.  The character also appeared ten television series, most notably the Walt Disney production featuring Guy Williams.  Actors who have played the character include Fairbanks, Power, Williams, Robert Livingston, Reed Hadley, Jose Suarez. Clayton Moore, Frank Langella, Henry Darrow, George Hamilton, Duncan Regehr, Anthony Hopkins, Antonio Banderas, Alain Delon, Christian Meier, Miguel Bernardeau, and Cristo Fernandez.

Zorro has also placed his signature "Z" on audio and radio dramas. comic books and graphic novels, comic strips, stage productions, and video games, as well in a number of adventures penned by other authors, including Steve Frazee, Jerome Preisler, James Lucerno, William McCay, David Bergantino, Frank Lauria, Scott Ciencin, and Isabil Allende.

That masked avenger has got some staying power.

Now follow Zorro as he fights the corrupt governor and military while protecting his secret identity as Don Diego.  When the beautiful Lolita spurns the attentions of Don Diego she sets her sights on the incomparable Zorro, not realizing they are the same person.  Love can be complicated in old Spanish California!

Enjoy.

https://s3.us-west-1.wasabisys.com/luminist/CB/4C_1949_05.pdf

FORGOTTEN BOOK: THE CITY DESTROYER

 The City Destroyer by "Grant Stockbridge" (Norvell W. Page) (first published in The Spider, January 1935, as the 16th of what would be 118 magazine novels; published in book form by Pocket Books as #3 in their Spider series; republished by Sanctum Books, 2003; republished in 2019 as #16 in the Spider series by Altus Press; also published in the Baen omnibus The Spider:  City of Doom as by7 Norvell Page, 2008; also available in e-book format)

For many, The Spider is the third greatest pulp magazine hero, following Doc Savage and The Shadow.  Don't believe them.  The Spider is Number One!  Doc Savage tends to descend into juvenile territory and The Shadow is burdened by cumbersome prose.  The Spider, however, just zips along, despite all odds as he wades through a large swarth of bodies and blood.  The Spider doesn't kid around; his adventures don't score up a few bodies, or even a few dozen -- death lurks in the thousands here with only a few caused by The Spider himself -- the rest can be laid to the most blood-thirsty villains in pulpdom.

The Spider. known as The Master of Men, is really wealthy-guy Richard Wentworth, who has vowed to eliminate those who prey on others.  He has no problem killing those who deserve it.  A master of disguise, he leaves the mark of The Spider on the foreheads of those he has killed as a warning to other evildoers.  The police silently cheer on his efforts while at the same time vowing to capture him and try him for murder.  One such is Wentworth's friend, Police Commissioner Stanley Kirkpatrick, who knows Wentworth is The Spider but (nudge, nudge, wink, wink) has never ben able to prove it; until he can, he turns a blind eye to The Spider's activities.

Those in The Spider's inner circle are Nita van Sloan, Wentworth's fiancee, she of the "spun blonde curls and the blue eyes that were like dewy violets;" Ran Singh, Wentworth's mega-loyal manservant, who at various times during the saga was a Sikh or a Hindu; Jackson, Wentworth's chauffeur, who served under him during World War I; Jenkyns, Wentworth's elderly butler who had been in service to Wentworth's family for years  -- his main purpose appears to be cooking fine meals and wishing Wentworth would drop all that crime fighting and just marry Nita; and Professor Brownlee, Wentworth's former teacher and war colleague, who can always be relied on for scientific advice, and whose uninghjust arrest had been the spur for Wentworth to become The Spider in the first place..  Over the course of The Spider's adventures, both Jackson and Brownlee are killed, but Jackson is later brought back to life.

Scientist Jim Collins had invented a substance that can turn steel into powder, b ut had died suddenly.  Police called the death a suicide, but The Spider thought otherwise, as did Collins's widow and his brother, Anse, a law officer from Culpepper, Virginia.  There had been a number of bank robberies lately that used this formula on bank vaults, allowing crooks to tear their way into the vaults as if the steel was mere paper.  Gang leader Devil Hackerson has been sent to the Collins apartment to get whatever papers the dead scientist may have had about his formula.  Sadly for him, The Spider was also there.  There was a shootout and two of the henchmen lay dead; Hackerson has managed to escape, but The Spider managed to signal to Ram Singh to follow the gang leader.  Meanwhile, the police have arrived and have surrounded the building, hoping to arrest The Spider.  (Of course they don't; The Spider has escaped many other traps, although one was particularly tricky.)

The evening The Spider gets an urgent call from Ram Singh.  He has followed Hackerson andbegins to tell something to Wentworth:  "The Sky Building, sahib,  They are pl--"  Then there was the sound of a gunshot, followed by silence.

It turns out that Devil Hackerson and his gang are merely stooges for a mysterious entity known as the Master.  The Master gives them the steel dissolving stuff and allows them to got on their merry bank-robbing way, but the Master demands obedience in return.  The Master's orders are given by a strange bald man with a squint in his eye.  (This man, previously unknown to the underworld goes by the obvious name of Baldy; I suppose Squinty would also be a good name for him but it just doesn't have the same cachet.)  The Master has ordered Hackerson to spread the formula on the steel girders holding up the Sky Building, New York's largest skyscraper, and Hackserson and his crew go ahead and do it, although they cant help but wonder why the Master wants to bring down the skyscraper.

Wentworth and Kirkpatrick rush to the Sky Building where they find the wounded Ram Sing bound on the top floor.  Ram Sing tells them of the plot and says that once the wind reaches a certain strength, it will be able to knock the huge building down.  And a gale is building.  And every one of the ninety-odd floors are heavily occupied.  With just minutes to go Wentworth and Kirkpatrick begin evacuating the building, while Kirkpatrick arranges for the area around the building to be cleared.  With the help of the police and fire departments, most of the building is cleared before it goes.   The falling building smashes an area of some five city blocks, bringing down other buildings.  All but a couple of hundred people managed to escape the tower, but the falling damages kills many more.  At least a thousand are dead and a true final count will be impossible.  The Spider vows vengeance on Hacksern.

But the worst is yet to come.  At the same time, another skyscraper in the city, the Plymouth building, has fallen, along with the Grand Central station.  At least with the Sky Building, there was a bit of warning and some lives were saved.  No such chance was afforded the Plymough building and Grand Central...

The Spider soon manages to track down Hackerson, but the crook pulled a gun and The Spider had to kill him before he could get any information about the Master of about Baldy.

Not long after, an express train non which Wentworth was a passenger derailed -- the rails themselves had turn to fine sugar.  Another gang boarded the wreckage, firing machine guns,  More senseless deaths.

Through it all, The Spider kept wondering, Why?  why all this death and destruction?  what was the Master's purpose?  And the suspicion grew that the Master knew that Wentworth was The Spider.  If that was so, both he and his friends were in deadly peril...

Like I said, the body count in The Spider books are massive.  The pace is break-neck and the odds are all but impossible.  The hero is unrelenting.  This is pulp magazine writing at its finest and most exciting.

The Spider was created by Popular Publications publisher Harry Steeger in an attempt to match the popularity of Street & Smith's The Shadow.  Steeger wanted a characte who would emulate the screen persona of Douglas Fairbanks.  For his creation, he turned to R. T. M. Scott, a Canadian novelist and pulp writer.  Scott transformed his characters detective Aurelius Smith and Hindu assistant Langa Doone into Wentworth and Ran Singh.  The first issue of The Spider, with Scott's novel, was dated October 1933; Scott also wrote The Spider's second adventure, but Scott's writing was felt too stodgy, so, beginning with the third, December 1933, issue, Norvell Page took over, eventually writing 92 of The Spider's adventures.  Other writers brought in were Donald Cormack, Wayne Rogers, Emile C. Tepperman, and Prentice Winchell.  The magazine closed with issue #118, dated December 1943. 

A final Spider adventure slated for issue #119 -- Slaughter, Inc., ghosted by Donald Cormack was eventually published in  1979 by Python Publishing, with the characters names changed for copyright reasons; it appeared as Blue Steel:  The Ultimate Answer to Evil by "Spider Page"; it was reprinted in its original unedited form in 2012 by Moonstone Books.  Since 2007 at least two original pastiche anthologies and four original novels about the character have appeared.   

The Spider also appeared in two movie serials, 1938 and 1941, and in numerous comic books and graphic novels. 

Many of The Spider's adventures have been reprinted and they always seem to find new fans.  Among notable fans of the character were Peanuts-creator Charles M. Schultz (who knew?) and Marvel Comics Stan Lee, who credited the character as a major influence in the creation of (you guessed it) Spider-Man.

And among the non-notable fans of The Spider, you can count --me.

CALLING ALL CARS: THE LAUGHING KILLER (FEBRUARY 10, 1937)

Before there was Dragnet, there was Calling All Cars, a crime drama focusing on "true" cases from the Los Angeles Police Department.  It aired first on the CBS West Coast Network and later on the Mutual-Don Lee Network.  It was sponsored by the Rio Grande Oil Company, which had dealers in California, and Nevada, and Arizona.  The company also issued a monthly Calling All Cars News, available free from its service stati9ons, which included articles relating to upcoming episodes; circulation of this bulletin eventually reached 400,000.  Outside of the Southwest, the program was carried by transcription in other area of the country, including Detroit, St. Louis. Syracuse, and Des Moines; eventually individual sponsors brought the show to various areas of the East Coast and the Midwest.

The program was hosted by Los Angeles Police Chief James E. Davis.  Charles Frederick Lindsey, a professor of speech education, was the narrator.  The actors were not credited.

Calling All Cars was produced and mostly written by William N. Robson, with Mel Williamson and Sam Pierce writing some of the episodes.  The show's director was Robert Hixon.

As one of the first police dramas on radio, many people were willing to overlook the crude and lackluster presentation of the program with its tedious recounting of efforts to catch killers and robbers.  Naytheless, justice was always served, and that counted a lot with its audience.

"The Laughing Killer" starts out on March 7, 1936 (hey, that's my wife's birthday; should would have been minus thirteen years old!) when, at a San Mateo gas station,  some "mugs with big guns walked in and took thirteen bucks out of the cash register."  Well, this will not stand and the police are called out.  It turns out it wasn't a robbery; the clerk wanted some cash and concocted a story about being held up.  the gas station guy gets 30 days for that.  While in jail, he begins to tell some strange stories to other inmates.  He claimed he swapped an old car and some lots for a house in Woodside and that the woman who had owned the house ran off with a Bulgarian officer.  This got Deputy Sheriff interested an he began to investigate.  The case goes on from there and you would not be surprised to learn that crooks are dumb and the police are not.

Interesting in its rambling way for what it is.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkruQEomZwM

SHORT STORY WEDNESDAY: THE NAKED GUN

"The Naked Gun" by John Jakes  (from Boot Hill:  An Anthology of the West. edited by Robert J. Randisi, 2002; first published in Short Stories, January 1957; also reprinted in More Wild Westerns, edited by Bill Pronzini, 1989; in The Best Western Stories of John Jakes, 1991; and in Great Stories of the American West II, edited by Martin H. Greenberg, 1997)

Boot Hill was a themed western anthology edited, and with an introduction and notes by Robert J. Randisi,  The first Boot Hill may have been in Dodge City (sources differ) and was so called because many of its occupants died with their boots on.  So it's the Dodge City Boot Hill that's the one referenced in this book, and the reader is given a tour by the "Gravedigger" of some of the more interesting graves therein.  The first story in the book is "The Naked Gun," and it is the only story in the book that had been printed before.  The remaining thirteen stories are original.

The grave in "The Naked Gun" is that of G. BODIE (183?-1873; "DO NOT SIN AGAINST THE CHILD" -- GEN.  42.22).

George Bodie is a feared gunslinger with eleven kills to his name, and he is hoping to soon make it an even dozen.  He has this thing for Lu, one of the girls working Chinese Annie's house in Dodge City, and had ridden two hundred miles to hook up with her again.  The house is run by Maebelle Tait (Chinese Annie having long since passed), who has two children, seven-year-old Tad who runs errands, and three-year-old Emma who likes to play with anything she can get her hands on.  Tad brings Bodie a message from the new town marshal, Dale Wyman, which tells Bodie that he must get out of town before midnight.  Reading this, Bodie thinks that he'll get his twelfth kill at midnight.

The marshal is not destined to be Bodie's dozenth kill, after all.  Lu enters and is about to take Bodie upstairs, when the door to Chinese Annie's opens and a cowboy named Fred enters.  He has had a standing date with Lu every six months and he has just ridden sixty miles to be with her.  He tries to get Lu from Bodie, and then makes a mistake by reaching for his gun.  Bodie plugs him in the chest before Fred could clear his gun.  So now Bodie had his twelfth kill; the marshal will make number thirteen.  there's still an hour and fifteen minutes before midnight and Bodie takes Lu upstairs.

Bodie wakes up an hour later.  Lu has gone.  Tad tells Bodie that the marshal is out in the street fifteen minutes early and wants to talk to him.  Bodie leaves his gun in his room and goes outside.  The marshal says he doesn't want o kill Bodie but he will if Bodie forces it.  He says he will not be alone; there will be others outside with guns trained on him.  Bodie calls him a coward and the marshal replies that Bodie is like a big cat going after his beef -- it doesn't matter how many kill the cat just as long as the cat will cause no further trouble.

Bodie heads back inside to get his gun but it is missing.  This throws Bodie into a panic and he rages through Chinese Annie's, demanding his Colt back.  Then he spots young Emma with the gun, plating with it as if it were a toy.  He viscously grabs the gun from Emma and goes out, determined to kill the marshal and any other person with him...

I won't spoil the twist here, but suffice to say that Bodie is now buried in Boot Hill, but we knew that from the start.

An interesting play on the western trope of the killer gunslinger vs. the peace-loving lawman.

The Jakes story is worth looking up on nits own, but I do recommend the complete anthology.  The other author represented in Boot Hill are Elmer Kelton, Wendi Lee, James Reasoner, L. J. Washburn, Tom Piccirilli, Randy Lee Eickhoff, John Helfers and Kerrie Hughes, Troy D. Smith, Robert Vaughan, Richard S. Wheeler, Ed Gorman, Marthayn Pelegrimas, and Marcus Galloway.

OVERLOOKED FILM: THE MAN WITH MY FACE (1951)

 Taking a trip into nightmare country, Chick Graham (Barry Nelson) heads home one day to find his exact double living there.  His own wife (Lynn Ainley) and his business partner (John Harvey) believe him to be an imposter and call the police.  Graham is carted off by the police but manages to escape when a Doberman, intending on attacking Graham, knocks over a policeman instead.  The nightmare grows when Graham is tagged as the man who got away with half a million dollars in a Miami bank robbery.  Pretty soon we now that the actual thief is the Graham look-alike, but then the bad guy's ex-girlfriend is murdered and Graham is accused of that.  Things look leak as the noose around Graham gets tighter.

Also featuring Jack Warden.  The film does not feature Jack Elam, although you might not believe it because actor Jim Boles could pass as a Jack Elam lookalike.  Nelson was a familiar figure  in films and television; he starred in several television series, including The Hunter (1952), My Favorite Husband (1953-1956), and Hudson's Bay (1959); he may best be remembered as the first James Bond in the 1954 television version of Casino Royale, playing opposite a villainous Peter Lorre.

Once you get past the unbelievable plot, this is a pretty good flick, with the tensions rising almost to Cornell Woolrich levels.  Plus, the film has the probable distinction of being the only 1950s film noir set in Puerto Rico.

This one is based on a novel by Samuel W. Taylor, who also worked on the screenplay with director Edward Montagne; also working on the screenplay were Vin Bogert and T. J. McGowan.

You should enjoy this one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLm-Ht3cFvs&list=PLcvObjGQpCd0vnqFWy0nbf-jdFlY36fyU&index=33

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BILLY ECKSTINE

 110 years ago, singer and bandleader Billy Eckstine was born in Pittsburg. 

Lionel Hampton said "He was one of the greatest singers of all time...We were proud of him because he was the first Black popular singer singing popular songs in our race.  We, the whole music profession, were so happy to see him achieve what he was doing.  He was one of the greatest singers of that era...He was our singer."

And Quincy Jones noted, "If he'd been white, they sky would have been the limit."

Enjoy a little bit of Billy Eckstine's magic:

"Misty"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dG223EVSEls

"Prisoner of Love"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWuGF-Xh-RM

"I Apologize"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFVFkVyQGNQ

"Passing Strangers"  (with Sarah Vaughan)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sk9NVZMNyiM

"Everything I Have Is Yours"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZZSirka0-U

"In the Still of the Night"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0c5B_Wod5o

"A Cottage for Sale"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-dl8855ITU

"Blue Moon"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSsYV930O10

"My Foolish Heart"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EehiIFxmrE8

"Prisoner of Love"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mA5ovlq7pEU

"As Time Goes By"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3RJwjQDuJM

"Caravan"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zB7gq0v5-I

HYMN TIME

 Jim Reeves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqwomT5YSiw

THE WAR IN CARTOONS: A HISTORY OF THE WAR IN 100 CARTOONS BY 27 OF THE MOST PROMINENT AMERICAN CARTOONISTS (1919)

Let's face it.  World War I was stupid, basically a family quarrel that got out of hand because of a few pig-headed persons.  Although it was started for spurious reasons, its consequences were very real and tragic -- the deaths of 15 to 22  million people, roughly half of them civilians.  The tragedy continued after the war as the spoils of war were partitioned with no thought about the eventual consequences.  The legacy of World War has lasted for over a century.

Enough tub-thumping on my part.

This book, edited by George T. Hecht, focuses a spotlight on German atrocities -- and there were plenty of them -- as seen through the lens of American newspapers.  Among the cartoonists represented were Charles Dana Gibson, James Montgomery Flagg, Windsor McCay, John T. McCutcheon, Paul Fung, J. H. Cassell, Oscar Cesare, and Rollin Kirby.  As propaganda these editorial cartoons certainly did the trick.  Try not to be affected by Rollin Kirby's "But Why Did You Kill Us?", or by O. P. Williams take on the execution of British nurse Edith Cavell, "German 'Kultur' ".

This was supposed to be The War To End All Wars.  It wasn't.  It would be nice if someday we learned the lessons that World War I taught us. but I'm not holding my breath.

A highly recommended book.

https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=90566&comicpage=&b=i.

FORGOTTEN BOOK: THE BALLAD OF BETA-2

The Ballad of Beta-2 by Samuel R. Delany (first published as an Ace SF Double, bound with Alpha Yes, Terra No! by Emile Petaja, 1965; issued separately several times by various publishers; also released as an Ace SF Double, bound with Delany's Empire Star, 1975; included in Delany's omnibus A.B.C.:  Three Short Novels, 2015)

The Sixties were a high point in science fiction.  It would not be far off the mark to say that this was the rea when the genre grew up.  (It should also be noted that science fiction had been undergoing a beneficial process of maturation before the Sixties, perhaps even before the John W. Campbell/Astounding era had begun in 1938; a fictional category dedicated to change inevitably had change hardwired into its DNA.)  SF in the Sixties reflect the world of the Sixties, a world where the past was not enough, a world where new ideas, new dreams, and new approaches beckoned.  For the science fiction fan, it introduced authors such as Roger Zelazny, Ursula K. LeGuin. and Thomas M. Disch.  Writers like J. G. Ballard, Brian W. Aldiss, Kurt Vonnegut, Harlan Ellison, and Robert Silverberg came into their own.  An era that started with Starship Troopers, Stranger in a Strange Land, and Dune, and just kept getting better.  A time of the New Wave (which wasn't very new, but SF fans did not know that). 

And one of the most exciting new authors of the Sixties was Samuel R. Delaney, who came bursting onto the scene with novels such as The Jewels of Aptor, Babel-17, The Einstein Intersection, Nova, and the Fall of the Towers trilogy (Captives of the Flame, The Towers of Toron, and City of a Thousand Suns), and such stories as "Empire Star," "The Star Pit," "Driftglass," "Aye, and Gomorrah...," "Lines of Power," "High Weir," and "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-precious Stones."  Literate stories that used old trope to portray something new, blending science, philosophy, and linguistics

The Ballad of Beta-2 was Delany's second published book, a short novel that he had begun in 1982, writing three-fourths of it in four days, at the same time he was beginning his Fall of the Towers Trilogy

Joneny T'waboga is a student of Galactic Anthropology who has been unwillingly assigned a thesis subject concerning an ancient ballad of the "Star Folk," a song recorded only once and dismissed by scholars as insignificant and derivative.  The Star Folk were descendants of passengers of generation star ships, each a city in itself traveling as less than light speed to reach their destination after centuries of travel.  Sixty years after the star ships began their trek, faster than light travel was achieved and, but the time they reached their destination, space had been conquered.  Only ten of the twelve ships arrived with passengers; two arrived arrived destroyed.  No one knew what had happened to them.  Those who did arrive, though, were suspicious and hostile to those already there, attacking any who tried to approach their ships.  A decision was made to let them be.  The ships were placed in an isolated orbits and its occupants were allowed to live as they wished.  Few tried to visit the ships and those who did usually regretted it.

The to ships that did not survive were the Sigma-9, which had a hole blasted in its side, and the Beta-2, which was nowhere to be seen.  Centuries before, a researcher approached the Sigma-9, but did not dare to enter it himself, sending a robot instead.  The robot brought back hints that the occupants committed mass suicide, as well as recorded records from the ship.  One of these was "The Ballad of Beta-2," which appeared to rely heavily on old-Earth concepts such as "cities" and "desert," and appeared wrapped in old-Earth allegory, making it easy to be dismissed by what few scholars looked at it.   The Star Folk themselves were considered to be a backwater, obsolete group not worthy of study.  So Joneny was visibly upset when his advisor told him to look into the source and the antecedents of the song.  He decided a quick trip out to Sigma-9, a fast look-around, and perhaps an interview with one or two Star Folk (if he could get them to agree) was all that was needed for the assignment.

Something was strangely off.  Joneny used a time stasis to view the approach into the ship.  The ship was covered in a shimmering green fire --but viewed in time stasis it was impossible for the ship to shimmer.  He entered the ship and found some old records that indicated that all of the generation ships had developed a phobia against change.  Each ship had developed a standard for a norm for its people.  Minor physical variations, however normal on Earth, were viewed as dangerous on the star ships.  Witch hunts and pogroms and slaughter of the "deviants" -- a Third Reich, McCarthy, MAGA madness has taken over.  (Yeah, I added the MAGA reference.  So sue me.)

Joneny also came across a strange humanoid, resembling a thirteen- or fourteen-year-old boy, whose legs worked as arms, who could survive in naked space, and who could appear and disappear at will.  The boy seemed helpful but answered Joneny's questions cryptically.  Strange things apparently happened to the generation ships while they were traveling in interstellar space.  The boy said his name was "The Children of the Destroyer."  Then others -- many others -- appeared, identical to the boy.  He said that they were him also.  The boy said his father (but not father) -- the Destroyer --  talked to him abut Joneny.  And the father/not father/Destroyer was the shimmering green fire...

This is a surprisingly hopeful novel, an interesting exploration of linguistics, prejudice, theology, ethno-culturalism, and -- within its bounds -- strict logic.  Just one reason why Delany knocked our socks off in the Sxities.