get yer hammer

American folk guy ( I was going to say icon, but he wouldn't like it) Pete Seeger turned 90 yesterday. Born in New York City May 3, 1919, to a family of thinkers and doers. His dad a musical historian, his mother a violinist and teacher. Aunts, uncles and siblings were either musicians, poets or in one case, an astronomer.

Pete's first instrument was the ukulele, odd considering the number and quality of trained musicians around his home growing up. But a uke means you gotta have something else to hold the audience, and for Pete it was the grace, charm, wit and respect that flowed from the stage when he performed. He learned early on to captivate listeners with his voice and a simple instrument.

In college, his life changed musically when he heard a banjo for the first time. He was so crazy learning the banjo and messing with politics that grades began to slip. He dropped out in 1938 and looked about for something meaningful to focus his creative talents on. He was a puppeteer briefly, but it was a stint helping folk historian Alan Lomax that got him on the radio and the exposure to a wider audience.

So how good was he? Lessee, formed the Weavers, worked with the likes of Woodie Guthrie and Leadbelly. Monster good actually. At 90 he's still works for what matters with people who care.

logical

Quick little reminder to all of you who may have slept for the last 40 years and missed anything to do with the science fiction thing. Leonard Nimoy was born this day in 1931.

Son of a barber he first started to get into film and TV around the end of the 50's. Bit parts in series and cheapo movies and the odd Twilight Zone was where he cut his teeth. Of note (I guess): Zombies of the Stratosphere was an installment in a movie serial that featured Nimoy as a martian. The stuff isn't very good. I mean really. The main character is some guy named Commander Cody. From there it goes downhill.

Oddly enough he appeared with William Shatner in 1964. They were in an episode of The Man from Uncle.

Is there a doctor in the house?

On this day in 1859 Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born. He came from an artistic family (at least on his fathers side) where his dad and uncles were noted artists of the day. Richard Doyle was a quite famous illustrator frequently appearing in Punch magazine. Arthur didn't show a leaning towards art so he went to college and became a doctor and by 1882 founded a practice with a school chum. This went sour pretty quick so he left a formed his own practice.

Business was slow for a new doctor in the town of Southsea so he started writing stories to fill the time. In 1887, A Study in Scarlet, the first Sherlocke Holmes short story came out in Beeton's Christmas Annual.

A few years later he became an eye doctor and moved to London in 1891. He set up shop and sat and waited but no patients came. Ever. His apparent lack of marketing skills in his medical practices was the book worlds gift. He wrote more and more Sherlocke Holmes stories.

But Doyle longed for a reputation as a serious author and to spend more time on his historical writing. He killed his hero off, then brought him back, but his heart was already elsewhere.

He had many sides, but a common outlet was his writing. For example his passionate defence of England in The War in South Africa: Its Cause and Conduct and The Great Boer War, his craving for justice in The Crime of the Congo.

After the death of his first wife in 1906, and up to the end of WWI, Doyle suffered through the deaths of many people close to him. His son, brother and 2 nephews died in a short span following the war. He soon turned to spiritualism and became an advocate of the pseudoscience of its proof of life beyond the grave. In 1921 he wrote The Coming of the Fairies about the Cottingley Fairies photographs.

Some of these are too good.

I can't make this stuff up, that's what is so damnable about history, it has happened, we gotta live with it. Anyway, a LOT of wonderful and odd people were born today so I've ripped off a list of my faves:

Frederick Arthur Stanley, 16th Earl of Derby. Born this day in 1841. He's hockey's Stanley Cup guy and for whom Vancouver's Stanley Park is named. Seems he enjoyed being Canada's Governor General.

Sonya Krukovsky Kovalevsky, in 1850. Brilliant mind, a mathematician of the highest calibre and author. Shunned by her native academia because she was a woman. She had to marry a man to move OUT of Russia to go to university.

Ernest Frederic Graham Thesiger, in 1879. English born stage and film actor. He went from appearing in drag on the British stage to working alongside Boris Karloff and Raymond Massey in such cult hits as the original Ghoul and Bride of Frankenstein. Quite a range.

Goodman Aiskowitz, aka Goodman Ace, in 1899. Known for his dry wit and playful personality. Originally a writer, he moved to radio almost by accident and enjoyed a career that spanned decades as a performer (often with his wife Jane)and as a writer for the best of the Hollywood stars. Jack Benny was a fan of Goodman and in the early years used Goodmans jokes in his act. Notorious for his cheap "persona" Benny would quip how much he had to pay for them. Goodman fired back ""Your check got lots of laughs. If you have any more, send them along."

Born in 1909, Gene Krupa. Legendary drummer who brought the instrument to the front of the bandstand and pioneered many modern percussion applications.

Martin Luther King Jr, born in 1929. "A man can't ride your back unless it's bent."

Gentelmen . . .

I tire of explosions, isotopes and molten sand. Nothing perks me up like a good birthday! It's David Ogden Stiers birthday today. Born in 1944 the actor known for his sophisticated edge has long been a TV staple. His most memorable work being "Winchester" in the MASH series. He is also a lover of classical music who actually knows his stuff; he has guest conducted for many symphony orchestras.

His early career was classical theatre and improv but he headed out west to Hollywood where he appeared on the Mary Tyler Moore Show and Kojak (oh my) among others. But it was in 1977 that he joined the cast of MASH where he won two Emmy's for his performance as a stuffy Bostonian.

His smooth authoritative voice projected breeding and style and was used in many animated movies and as voice overs for such diverse projects as Beauty and the Beast, the Myst PC game series AND George Lucas' THX 1138.

David Odgen Stiers shares his birthday with that well known bandleader Kinky Friedman.

Handsome devil.

Engelbert Humperdinck, German composer was born on this day, September 1, 1854. He began composing at a very early age, and enjoyed little support from his parents, who preferred to have an architect instead.

Music was his life and he worked on many projects winning scholarships and competitions throughout Europe. His most famous work, the opera Hansel and Gretel, came in 1893. Heavily influenced by Richard Wagner (even worked for him as his assistant). He died on September 22, 1921 while attending a performance of his son directing Der Freischutz.

Rear Window

British director, Alfred Hitchcock, born this day, in 1899 at Leytonstone, London England. Writer, director, producer and actor with nearly 70 films and TV shows to his credit. As an actor he is almost always seen in passing; in silhouette or in the back of a scene, coming or going.

He started his career in film by designing opening titles and got his start directing in Germany between the wars. His first outing was a failure but moving back to England he directed "The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog" which earned him his first hit. Another first from his early career is one of the first talkies made in England "Blackmail".

For a complete film history and comprehensive list of what he did where and with what crew and actor see http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000033/

Smoke me a kipper

Born July 25, 1955, Jem (Jeremy)Finer of the Pogues. He played guitar, bass and banjo. He teamed up with Shane Magowan in 1981 to from the Pogues. They tried busking for a while and when they auditioned for a busking license at Covent Garden they were turned down. An onlooker said"Very few people have come here and failed what we like the to call the Covent Garden Seal of Quality. I'm sorry, you have failed."

Pogue Mahone.

Pass the plate.

On this day in 1730 Josiah Wedgwood was born. An English potter, he is perhaps best known for "jasper ware", the blue and white pottery that instantly identifies English pottery around the world. Started in 1774 it is still being made today.

Early in his career he met and became friends with Erasmus Darwin and when long time business associate Thomas Bentley died, he asked Erasmus to come on board. Josiah's daughter wound up marrying Erasmus's son and they had, amongst other children, you guessed it, Charles Darwin.

Birthday alert

Yes its true. Cheap Trick drummer, Bun E. Carlos, born on June 12, 1951.