11,698 stories by "Trav S.D."
I briefly considered holding this piece until Andrew Dice Clay (Andrew Clay Silverstein, b. 1957) passed away so I could call it "The Diceman Goeth", but if the 45th President is any example…
Tomorrow, September 29 (2024, for those of you who don't look at the dates of things, after all this post won't always be new) is National Silent Movie Day! Lots of exciting things are happe…
Having paid tribute to David Sarnoff and the founding of the NBC empire, in the name of equal time today we give a respectful nod to William S. Paley, honcho of CBS (1901-1990). Paley's mill…
September 27, 1954 marked the premiere of NBC's The Tonight Show. That is a startling statistic. Several related superlatives amplify the impressiveness: it is the world's longest running ta…
Counterintuitive but true: if you were to cross Shug Fisher (George Clinton Fisher, 1907-1984) with Fuzzy Knight, the result would not be Suge Knight. Fisher was a rustic character actor, co…
Happy National Comic Book Day! We sieze the occasion to present you with a handy finding aid for all the comic book series we have written about on Travalanche. (Did your grandmother used to…
September 25, 1974 was the release date of the horror film The Mutations a.k.a. Freakmaker. The Mutations is the farthest thing from a classic, even (arguably) a horror classic, but it has i…
Leah Hing (1907-2001) was the first female Chinese-American pilot. The Oregon aviatrix got her pilot's license in 1934, and she definitely stunted with flying circuses, but the real reason I…
September 23 is World Gorilla Day, and to mark it, we add to our growing store of posts bundling our many posts related to particular animals. The gorillas of animals on stage and screen are…
We plugged this book a couple of days ago; time to lean into that a little more for Jim Henson's birthday! This is our seventh post about the Muppet mogul and/or his felt companions, and it'…
Folks in the New York area! Please join me, Wednesday, October 2, 7pm for a simultaneous celebration of Groucho Marx's birthday and the release of my new book The Marx Brothers Miscellany. T…
"They seek him here, they seek him there/ Those Frenchies seek him everywhere/ Is he in heaven or is he in hell? That damned elusive Pimpernel." Baroness Orczy (Emma Magdalena Rozália MÅ
Got the word from Ms. Eve Golden that Bette Bourne (Peter Bourne, b.1939) passed away last month. It being just a few weeks prior to his natal day, I opted to wait to do a tribute. How I wis…
Born this day, yet 50 years gone, actor Allan Lane (Harry Leonard Albertshardt, 1909-1973). We cut to the chase to let you know that of Lane's over 125 screen credits, the best known are the…
OMG! So….um, I can now say I did a project with Mr. Mandy Patinkin. I just had the thrilling experience of hearing him say my name in that Mandy Patinkin voice. A podcast I recorded many m…
We first became aware of (or took note of) actress Dawn Addams (Victoria Dawn Addams, 1930-1985) from her prominent role as "Ann, the TV specialist" in Charlie Chaplin's A King in New York (…
Happy birthday to Ben Ohmart of Bear Manior Media! And good news for lovers of show biz books! Ben is offering 20% off the cover price for all Bear Manor Books through Sunday (September 22, …
I had been a fan of filmmaker Mary Harron (b. 1953) for years before I realized (quite recently) that I had also been a fan of her father for many decades. I grew up watching her dad Don Har…
Annette Funicello got her own post here a couple of years ago, and well it just feels lopsided not to give equal time to her screen partner. And also, Frankie Avalon (Francis Avallone, b. 19…
This year National Voter Registration Day falls on Constitution Day " the stars are alligned to send a message: vote November 5 to save the U.S. Constitution. Well into the 20th century we u…
September 17, 1944 was the premiere date of The Baby Snooks Show on CBS radio (it later switched to NBC, hence the call letters on the mic in the photo above). We've done many a post on Snoo…
I first learned the story of Mildred Fish Harnack (1902-1943) with Erik Larson's 2011 book In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin. Harnack was the o…
This has always been my favorite photo of Lauren Bacall (Betty Perske, 1924-2014). I like the fact that it appears uncharacteristically candid, with almost nothing observably artifical about…
For the life of me I can't recall how I stumbled upon the existence of Janelee "Twinkle" Watts (1933-2018), and I only know the public part of the story, but it seemed worth sharing. Born in…
Yes, it's true! The birthday of Joey Heatherton (b. 1944) is a couple of days after that of Lola Falana (b. 1942). I don't know if Catherine O'Hara knew that when she cooked up her satirical…
