Hefty Baritones

Starting from left are baritones, Edward Arnold (Gunther Edward Arnold Schneider 1890-1956) and his heavyweight "successor" Robert Middleton (Samuel G. Messer 1911-77) on the right. Both could play criminals, wealthy bankers, or landowners in comedies or dramas. Sometimes mean, sometimes likable. Arnold missed the television era but was famous for his numerous first-rate films in the 1930s and 1940s. Although Middleton had a few motion pictures under his belt, he was most visible on the small screen in a wide variety of roles for nearly twenty-five years starting in the 1950s.

The Sherman Antitrust Act

The Standard Oil Company (1870-1911) was the largest petroleum company in the world, and its success made its co-founder and chairman, John D. Rockefeller, among the wealthiest Americans of all time and among the richest people in modern history. The self-made billionaire was the perfect target for government to step "in all fairness" to split the company up into 43 companies of historical confusion by the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1911. 

The 2022 chart above shows the break up of Standard Oil

Twentieth Century Talkers

Monty Hall (1921-2017) was a radio and television show host who moved to the United States to pursue a career in broadcasting. Born as Monte Halparin in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Hall graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Manitoba, where he majored in chemistry and zoology. While still a student in the mid-Forties, he worked at CKRC radio in Winnipeg. 

For the next decade, Hall hosted and produced a number of programs for radio stations in Toronto before moving to New York City in 1955. Hall guest-hosted established game shows such as Strike It Rich on CBS and Twenty-One on NBC. He was also a radio analyst for the New York Rangers of the National Hockey League during the 1959-1960 season, before succeeding Jack Narz as host of a game show called Video Village. 

Bigger things were in store with his move to Southern California, where he became the host of the game show Let's Make a Deal, which he developed and produced with business partner Stefan Hatos. It became his crowning broadcasting achievement and for what he is best known. The “Monty Hall” name became synonymous with a game show host and was often parodied in comedic skits, providing creativity for what was "behind door number one, two, or three." Hall was producer or executive producer of numerous other game shows throughout his career.

In May 1988, the Governor-General of Canada appointed him an officer of the prestigious The Order of Canada for his humanitarian work in Canada and other nations of the world. In 2003, the Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba appointed him a Member of the Order of Manitoba.

The Constellation of Orville

On this date in 1944, Orville Wright took the controls of a United States Army Air Force Lockheed C-69 Constellation during a short demonstration flight over Dayton, Ohio. It was his first piloting experience in 25 years. Below is an excerpt from This Day in History site:

After the flight, Wright said, “It was absolutely marvelous. . . You can say that I ran the whole thing. Put exclamation points and question marks around that—because all I had to do was just let it take care of itself. . . I enjoyed every minute. I guess a ran the whole plane for a minute. But I let the machine take care of itself. I always said airplanes would fly themselves if you left them alone.”

When the Uniform Fits

William Boyett (1927-2004) was an American actor best known for his television roles in law enforcement dramas on television. Aside from a handful of uncredited film roles early in his career, he was a mainstay of television from the 1950s through the 1990s. The handsome actor was known for his tight, frontal baritone vocal delivery and looking right at home in a uniform.

Harry William Boyett was born in Akron, Ohio, and showed an interest in theater at a young age. He won a Shakespeare competition in high school, which led to acting jobs in radio. After his service in the Navy during World War II, he performed on the stage in both New York City and Los Angeles. By the mid-Fifties, his career was jump-started with recurring roles in over sixty-five episodes of Highway Patrol. Boyett also portrayed a policeman in such diverse series as Bat Masterson; Batman; and Star Trek: The Next Generation. He had roles on Sea Hunt in ten episodes, eight episodes of Perry Mason, and nine episodes of Dragnet 1967. But by far his most visible role was as Sgt. "Mac" MacDonald on 129 episodes of Adam 12.

Through the 1960s and 1970s, Boyett found steady work on such diverse series as Laramie, I Spy, The Andy Griffith Show, Fantasy Island, The Love Boat, The Rockford Files, Gunsmoke, Emergency!, Knight Rider, Murphy Brown, and Night Court. Boyett's final visible role, not surprisingly as a desk sergeant, ended his career on a low note in the direct-to-video live-action comedy, Theodore Rex (1995).

Stylish and Sporty for 1956

With the exception of the Chrysler New Yorker, Chrysler Corporation's most striking sedan for 1956 was from their Dodge division in the form of the Custom Royal Lancer 2-door hardtop or convertible. Not the clean front grille design of the New Yorker, but Dodge's more aggressive, detailed design works. It was a similar design carried over from 1955. Aside from Dodge's touted performance were the optional three-color paint combinations coupled with the one-year-only color accent design that began on the hood and continued to the fins and rear deck. It gave the model a sporty position in their lineup. Certainly out-classing the rather dowdy design from Plymouth's division. It all translated into style without being garish, something infamously in Chrysler's near future. 

Broadcast Pioneers

Harry Reasoner (1923-1991) was an American journalist for CBS and ABC News. Known for his artful use of wording as a television commentator, he won three Emmy Awards and a 1967 George Foster Peabody Award.

The Iowa-born Reasoner developed an interest in journalism while attending High School in Minneapolis. He also started developing a dry wit that got him into a bit of trouble for an original class reading. He studied journalism at Stanford University before serving in the Army during World War II. Reasoner resumed his journalism career with The Minneapolis Times and wrote a novel, Tell Me About Women, written partly during his war service, and was first published in 1946. In two years he was working in radio for CBS. In ten years Reasoner was working for CBS News in New York. 

Reasoner teamed up with Mike Wallace to launch 60 Minutes in 1968. Reasoner was hired away from CBS by ABC as an anchor on the network's evening newscast alongside Howard K. Smith until 1975. He eventually took the sole anchor position while Smith moved into a commentary role. It was back to cohost status with the hire of Barbara Walters away from NBC. Her celebrity status did not sit well with the die-hard journalist. Perhaps by request, he was hired back at CBS in 1978 and returned to 60 Minutes in what would turn out to be his most memorable role. Reasoner retired in 1991.

Broadcast Pioneers

Howard K. Smith (1914-2002) was an American journalist, radio reporter, television anchorman, and political commentator. He was one of the legends of early television news broadcasting. His initial "K" stood for Kingsbury.

Smith's career blossomed by 1940, when he was sent to Berlin, joining the CBS network under Edward R. Murrow, making him one of the original members of the team of war correspondents known as one of Murrow Boys. Smith returned to Berlin to recap the German surrender in May of 1945.  went to London for CBS with the title of chief European correspondent. CBS sent him to London in 1947, to make a broadcasting tour of most of the nations of Europe, including behind the Iron Curtain.

Smith was embroiled in a contract dispute with CBS in 1962 for editorializing during a broadcast. He was subsequently fired. With his move to the ABC network, Smith reported on the Robert F. Kennedy assassination, moderated political debates, and assessed President Lyndon Johnson's presidency. Smith became the first national television commentator to call for Nixon's resignation over Watergate. Smith remained a co-anchor at ABC until 1975.

Smith was honored five times with various awards, spanning 1955 to 1963. He made a number of appearances in motion pictures and television as himself over nearly a twenty-year period starting in 1964.

Sensitive and Quirky

Sian Barbara Allen (1946-) is a former American actress whose television work was her claim to fame. She was nominated for a Golden Globe Award as New Star of the Year for her performance in the film, You'll Like My Mother. Still, it was in television where she was a readily available guest star throughout the 1970s, including roles in made-for-television movies, including Scream, and Pretty Peggy, opposite Bette Davis. She was perhaps best known for her sometimes quirky or emotionally sensitive roles with sad, downturned eyebrows.

Allen appeared in two episodes of the popular TV series The Waltons, 1973 as Jenny Pendleton, an early love interest of John-Boy Walton. A short list of her television appearances was The Incredible Hulk, Ironside, a particularly humorous role on The Rockford Files (above), Alias Smith and Jones, Bonanza, Kojak, Columbo: Lovely but Lethal, Adam-12, and Hawaii Five-O. After her appearance on L.A. Law in 1990, she retired from acting.

Broadcast Pioneers

The Huntley-Brinkley Report was a trusted news source in the early television years. Having two anchors may have seemed a bad idea but the authoritative style of Chet Huntley, reporting from New York, and David Brinkley, from Washington, DC, proved to be a big success. The program ran fifteen minutes at its inception in 1956 but expanded to thirty minutes in 1963, following the lead of the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite. The signature theme music used for the broadcast was by Ludwig van Beethoven with an ending theme being his Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, Op. 125, second movement, of the Ninth Symphony. It was broadcast from a 1952 studio recording conducted by Arturo Toscanini of the NBC Symphony Orchestra.

NBC executives were growing dissatisfied with John Cameron Swayze and the Camel News Caravan. It began falling behind CBS's Douglas Edwards with the News. As a result, Swayze was out and Huntley-Brinkley was in. Huntley handled the bulk of the news most nights, with Brinkley specializing in Washington politics. They possessed a strong chemistry with viewers liking that the anchors talked to each other. In reality, aside from their sign-off, Huntley and Brinkley's only communication came when one anchor finished a story and handed off to the other by saying the other's name, a signal to an AT&T technician to switch the long-distance transmission lines from New York to Washington or vice versa.

By 1965, the program brought in more advertising revenue than any other on television. Critics considered Huntley to possess one of the best broadcast voices ever, and Brinkley's dry, often witty, news writing presented viewers with a contrast to the often sober output from CBS News. NBC producer, Reuven Frank, wrote their closing lines which were for decades one of the most parodied catchphrases on television: "Good night, Chet. Good night, David...and good night, for NBC News." With Huntley's announced retirement, their last news broadcast together was during the summer of 1970.

Note: The 1980s television sketch comedy, SCTV, gave Rick Moranis an opportunity to parody Brinkley with extraordinary comedic accuracy, visually and vocally.

In the image above, the NBC news crew prepares for an oval office interview with President Kennedy (seated) in September 1963. Standing, facing, is Brinkley. To his left in Huntley.

Shrine of Democracy

The Lakota tribe's symbolism referred to the now famous granite rock formation as "Six Grandfathers," which symbolized deities personified in six directions: north, south, east, west, above (sky), and below (earth). The mountain never had an official name until after 1877. New York attorney Charles E. Rushmore visited the Black Hills to confirm the Harney Peak Tin Company's land claims. His South Dakota guide suggested it be named after Rushmore. The carving was the idea of Doane Robinson, a historian for the state of South Dakota. The concept and design evolved during the planning stages. Robinson originally wanted the sculpture to feature American West heroes, such as Lewis and Clark, their guide Sacagawea, Oglala Lakota chief Red Cloud, Buffalo Bill Cody, and Oglala Lakota chief Crazy Horse. Regardless of the subjects, controversy would have been inevitable as the land was never returned to the Sioux Nation. As so often happens throughout history, the "elite" in society institute their own ideals on how things should be run. 

Sculptor Gutzon Borglum designed the sculpture, referred to as the Shrine of Democracy, and oversaw the project's execution from 1927 to 1941 with the help of his son, Lincoln Borglum. The impressive sculpture features the 60-foot-tall heads of four United States presidents chosen to represent the nation's birth, growth, development and preservation, respectively. The original design was to include some view of the torsos (see above model), but when funding ran out, the project ceased leaving only the faces. Mount Rushmore attracts over two million visitors annually.