Glenn Miller’s 1940 hit “PEnnsylvania 6-5000” refers to the telephone number of the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York City, where Miller’s orchestra often played.
It still works: 212-736-5000 is the hotel’s main number.
Entertainment
Clockwise
Germany Schaefer stole first base. On Aug. 4, 1911, playing for the Washington Senators, Schaefer stole second base conventionally, hoping to draw a throw from the catcher so a teammate could steal home. The catcher didn’t throw, so on the next pitch Schaefer ran back to first.
That was legal at the time, but rule 7.08i now forbids a player to run the bases in reverse order “for the purpose of confusing the defense or making a travesty of the game.”
Duck Soup
T.S. Eliot was a fan of Groucho Marx. The two maintained a correspondence through the early 1960s, when Groucho accepted a long-offered dinner with the poet.
Eliot wrote: “The picture of you in the newspapers saying that, amongst other reasons, you have come to London to see me has greatly enhanced my credit in the neighborhood, and particularly with the greengrocer across the street. Obviously I am now someone of importance.”
Strange Interlude
When Clark Gable left the Army in June 1944, Ronald Reagan signed his discharge papers.
Trivium
California and Florida both have an Orange County.
By coincidence, one contains Disneyland, the other Disney World.
Silver Bullet
The Lone Ranger’s creed, devised by creator Fran Striker:
I believe:
- That to have a friend, a man must be one.
- That all men are created equal and that everyone has within himself the power to make this a better world.
- That God put the firewood there, but that every man must gather and light it himself.
- In being prepared physically, mentally, and morally to fight when necessary for that which is right.
- That a man should make the most of what equipment he has.
- That “this government of the people, by the people, and for the people” shall live always.
- That men should live by the rule of what is best for the greatest number.
- That sooner or later … somewhere … somehow … we must settle with the world and make payment for what we have taken.
- That all things change but truth, and that truth alone lives on forever.
- In my Creator, my country, my fellow man.
“The Keats of Chess”
Rudolf Charousek had been playing chess for only four years when he found himself facing this position against Jakob Wollner at Kaschau in 1893:
He found one of the most immortally pretty finishes in chess history — to discover it, read Kester Svendsen’s 1947 short story “Last Round,” which the game inspired.
Three years afterward, Charousek defeated Lasker at Nuremberg. “I shall have to play a championship match with this man someday,” the master remarked, but it was not to be — the Hungarian died of tuberculosis in 1900, at only 26.
There Can Be Only One
A do-it-yourself dancing highlander, from Frank Bellew’s The Art of Amusing (1866). Cut him out, stitch him to a glove, and make little socks for your fingers.
“You move about the fingers, simulating a man dancing the Highland-fling or double-shuffle, and the result will be very curious and eminently satisfactory.”
Horror Show
Vincent Price and Christopher Lee have the same birthday — May 27.
Lord Stanley’s Mug
The Stanley Cup travels more than 100,000 miles a year, making it the best-traveled championship trophy in the world. Misadventures:
- In 1905, the Ottawa Silver Seven tried to drop-kick it over the Rideau Canal on the Ottawa River. (They failed.)
- In 1906, it went missing after a photography session. It turned out the photographer’s mother had adopted it as a planter for geraniums.
- In 1924, the Montreal Canadiens left it by the side of the road while changing a tire.
- In 1940, managers burned the mortgage of Madison Square Garden in the cup, which the Rangers won that year. (This occasioned a “curse” that kept the Rangers from the cup for 54 years.)
- In 1980, New York Islander Clark Gillies fed his dog from it.
- In 1991, Pittsburgh Penguin Mario Lemieux tried to float it in his swimming pool. It sank. (Colorado Avalanche goalkeeper Patrick Roy later did the same thing.)
- In 1994, Ranger Ed Olczyk filled it with oats to feed Kentucky Derby winner Go for Gin.
- In 1996, Avalanche defenseman Sylvain Lefebvre had his daughter baptized in it.
Plus untold numbers have slept with it and urinated in it — one hopes in that order.