Mae West never kissed her leading men on screen.
The Apollo program was born, and five months before the end of the decade, NASA displayed pictures of Americans on the moon, proof that we had beat the Russians to the most important prize. We won. Mission accomplished.
But was it accomplished by actually sending men to the moon, or just making it look that way?
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon
Investigative journalist Bart Sibrel claims to have found a mislabeled NASA film showing multiple “takes” of a scene shown to the public as part of the “live” broadcast of the Apollo 11 flight. In the footage the astronauts appear to be rehearsing the lines the public heard. Sibrel claims to have spent half a million dollars investigating the moon landings, and produced a video called A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon.
In 2002 Sibrel, backed by a Japanese film crew, confronted Buzz Aldrin outside a Beverly Hills hotel and challenged him to swear on a Bible that he had really gone to the moon. Aldrin responded by punching Sibrel in the face.
And what about those marvelous still photos? Many believe they were staged, perhaps in a secret location in Nevada, or even in a giant geodesic soundstage in Australia. Either way it would have been much easier to manipulate the lighting to get the results shown in the moon landing photos.
Would such a monstrous hoax have been easy to pull off? Certainly not. But to some people it seems more possible—and cheaper—than actually sending someone to the moon and back. Consider these statistics: Of the seven manned missions to the Moon, only Apollo 13 had trouble, which is an 86% success rate. In the years since, 25 unmanned craft have been sent to Mars. Only seven have succeeded—a 28% success rate. Which figure seems more realistic?
JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT IT WAS SAFE
Before you get too comfortable with the idea that the government created a huge hoax because we couldn’t have possibly gone to the moon, keep in mind that there are also people who believe the film is fake, but that we actually did go to the moon. So why fake it? To cover up what we really found there. But that’s another story…
One in five people alive today is Chinese.
LIMERICKS
Limericks have been around since the 1700s. Here are a few of the more “respectable” ones that our BRI readers have sent in.
The one-eyed old painter McNeff
Was color-blind, palsied, and deaf;
When he asked to be touted
The critics all shouted:
“This is art, with a capital F!”
A certain young man of great gumption,
Among cannibals had the presumption
To go—but, alack!
He never came back.
A bona fide case of consumption.
An amoeba named Sam and his brother,
Were having a drink with each other;
In the midst of their quaffing
They split their sides laughing,
And each of them now is a mother.
There once was a fellow named Paul
Who went to a masquerade ball
Dressed up like a tree,
But he failed to foresee
His abuse by the dogs in the hall.
A cheerful old bear at the zoo
Could always find something to do.
When it bored him, you know,
To walk to and fro,
He reversed it and walked fro and to.
There was a faith-healer of Deal
Who said, “Although pain isn’t real,
If I sit on a pin
And it punctures my skin,
I dislike what I think that I feel.”
An amorous dentist named Moss,
Fell in love with the charming Miss Ross;
But he held in abhorrence
Her given name Florence,
So he called her his dear Dental Floss.
A man to whom illness was chronic,
When told that he needed a tonic,
Said, “Oh, Doctor, dear,
Won’t you, please, make it beer?”
“No, no,” said the doc, “that’s Teutonic.”
There was a young lady from Natchez
Who sat in some briar-wood patches.
Now she lies on her face
With an awful grimace
And scratches and scratches and scratches.
There was a young poet from Crewe,
Whose limericks stopped at line two.
Leprosy is the oldest documented infection—first described in Egypt in 1350 B.C.
NOT-SO-WISEGUYS
When people enter the federal government’s Witness Protection Program they’re supposed to hide, right?
WISEGUY: Henry Hill, a member of New York’s Lucchese crime family and participant in the $5.8 million Lufthansa heist from New York’s Kennedy Airport in 1978, the largest cash theft in U.S. history
IN THE PROGRAM: The Witness Protection Program relocated him to Redmond, Washington, in 1980, and Hill, who’d changed his name to Martin Lewis, was supposed to keep a low profile and stay out of trouble. He wasn’t very good at either—in 1985 he and writer Nicholas Pileggi turned his mob exploits into the bestselling book Wiseguy, which became the hit movie Goodfellas.
WHAT HAPPENED: When the book became a bestseller, “Martin Lewis” couldn’t resist telling friends and neighbors who he really was. Even worse, he reverted to his life of crime. Since 1980 Hill has racked up a string of arrests for crimes ranging from drunk driving to burglary and assault. In 1987 he tried to sell a pound of cocaine to two undercover Drug Enforcement officers, which got him thrown out of the Witness Protection Program for good.
“Henry couldn’t go straight,” says Deputy Marshal Bud McPherson. “He loved being a wiseguy. He didn’t want to be anything else.”
WISEGUY: Aladena “Jimmy the Weasel” Fratianno, Mafia hit man and acting head of the Los Angeles mob. When he entered the Witness Protection Program in 1977, Fratianno was the highest-ranking mobster ever to turn informer.
IN THE PROGRAM: Fratianno has another claim to fame: he is also the highest-paid witness in the history of the program. Between 1977 and 1987, he managed to get the feds to pay for his auto insurance, gas, telephone bills, real-estate taxes, monthly checks to his mother-in-law, and his wife’s facelift and breast implants.
WHAT HAPPENED: The Justice Department feared the payments made the program look “like a pension fund for aging mobsters,” so he was thrown out of the program in 1987. But by that time, Fratianno had already soaked U.S. taxpayers for an estimated $951,326. “He was an expert at manipulating the system,” McPherson said. Fratianno died in 1993.
Actors are called thespians after Thespis, the Greek founder of theater.
WISEGUY: James Cardinali, a five-time murderer who testified against Gambino crime boss John Gotti at his 1987 murder trial. Gotti, nicknamed the “Teflon Don,” beat the rap, but Cardinali still got to enter the Witness Protection Program after serving a reduced sentence for his own crimes. After his release, federal marshals gave him a new identity and relocated him to Oklahoma.
IN THE PROGRAM: Witnesses who get new identities aren’t supposed to tell anyone who they really are, and when Cardinali slipped up and told his girlfriend in 1989, the program put him on a bus to Albuquerque, New Mexico, and told him to get lost.
But Cardinali wouldn’t leave quietly. When he got to Albuquerque, he made signs that read “Mob Star Witness” and “Marked to Die by the Justice Department.” Then, wearing the signs as a sandwich board, he marched back and forth in front of the federal courthouse, telling reporters he would continue his protest until he was let back into the program or murdered by mobsters, whichever came first. “If I get killed,” Cardinali told reporters. “I want everybody to see what they do to you.”
WHAT HAPPENED: Cardinali flew to Washington D.C. to appear on CNN’s Larry King Live. But leaving the state violated his parole, so when he got back to New Mexico he was arrested, t
aken to jail…and released into the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service. Then he vanished. Did he embarrass the Witness Protection Program into letting him back in? The Marshals Service “will neither confirm nor deny” that he did.
WISEGUY: John Patrick Tully, convicted murderer and member of the Campisi crime family of Newark, New Jersey
IN THE PROGRAM: Tully served a reduced sentence for murder and entered the Witness Protection Program in the mid-1970s. By the early 1980s, he was living in Austin, Texas, where, as “Jack Johnson,” he worked as a hot dog and fajita vendor. (It was a “nostalgic” choice—years earlier, he’d robbed a bank and used the money to buy a hot dog cart.)
Tully’s business thrived, but he had repeated run-ins with the police and was arrested numerous times for public intoxication and drunk driving. At some point the police figured out who “Mr. Johnson” really was and then, Tully alleges, they started harassing him.
In 1986 a guard in an armored car was killed when $50,000 worth of quarters fell on him.
WHAT HAPPENED: Tully fought back by publicly revealing his true identity. He wrapped himself—literally—in the American flag, and, standing on the steps of city hall with his seven-page rap sheet in one hand and a beer in the other, announced his entry in the 1991 race for mayor. His reasons for running: 1) As a reformed criminal he was a better candidate than typical politicians who “get into office and then start crooking,” and 2) “If the police are going to hit me, they’re going to have to hit me in the limelight.”
Tully actually won 496 votes…but lost the race.
WISEGUY: Joseph “Joe Dogs” Iannuzzi, bookie, loan shark, and member of New York’s Gambino crime family from 1974 to 1982
IN THE PROGRAM: Joe Dogs had a reputation for being an excellent cook—even in the mob. After turning State’s evidence in 1982, he supported himself by opening a bagel shop in Florida.
Then in 1993 he wrote The Mafia Cookbook. How can someone in the Program promote a book? They can’t—witnesses are forbidden from contact with the media, and Joe Dogs had to pass on several offers to appear on TV. But he was a huge fan of David Letterman, so when he was asked to appear on The Late Show, he agreed, even though he risked being thrown out of the program. Why would he take the chance? “Dave was my idol,” Iannuzzi explained.
WHAT HAPPENED: It finally dawned on somebody at The Late Show that bringing a man marked for death by the mob into New York City and putting him on TV with Dave in front of a live studio audience might not be such a good idea. At the last minute, just as Joe Dogs was getting ready to cook Veal Marsala, show staffers told him his segment had been cancelled.
Iannuzzi was furious—according to some accounts he even threatened to “whack” Letterman. And although he never actually went on the show, the U.S. Marshals Service kicked him out of the Witness Protection Program anyway.
“What am I going to do now? Well,” he told reporters, “I can always cook.”
Duh! A hijacker took over a public bus in Argentina—and insisted on being driven to Cuba.
BEHIND THE HITS
Ever wonder what inspired some of your favorite songs? Here are a few inside stories about popular tunes.
The Artist: Santana
The Song: “Smooth” (1999)
The Story: One night in 1997, Rob Thomas, lead singer of Matchbox 20, had a dream: he was on the cover of Rolling Stone shouting something into the ear of one of his musical heroes, guitar legend Carlos Santana. A month later, Thomas was invited by R&B composer Itaal Shur to contribute a song to Santana’s next album. Thomas was thrilled.
They wrote a song (inspired by Thomas’s wife, Marisol Maldonado) and sent a rough demo tape to Santana. Thomas recommended English pop star George Michael for the vocals, but Santana liked what he heard on the demo, “I believe it when he sings.” So Thomas flew to San Francisco to meet his idol and record the song.
“Smooth” was Santana’s first #1 song ever (it was on top for 12 weeks in 1999), was his first to reach the top 10 in 30 years, earned Thomas BMI’s Pop Songwriter of the Year award, and won nine Grammies. (Santana made the cover of Rolling Stone in March, 2000…without Thomas.)
The Artist: The Charlie Daniels Band
The Song: “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” (1979)
The Story: Starting his music career in 1959, virtuoso fiddle player Charlie Daniels had enjoyed moderate success as a session musician and songwriter. He was known in music circles but the Charlie Daniels Band couldn’t get much radio airplay—he was too country for rock stations, too hard rock for country stations.
In 1979 Daniels decided to write the “ultimate fiddle song.” While brainstorming for ideas, he remembered a Stephen Vincent Benet poem he had learned in school called “The Mountain Whippoorwill.” In the poem, Hill-Billy Jim enters a fiddlin’ contest and then “all hell breaks loose in Georgia.”
Daniels modernized the words, but went into the studio without any music. Armed with only a poem about a boy who beats the devil, Daniels and his band did something just as improbable—they created a hit right there on the spot.
Mark Twain invented a Trivial Pursuit–like game called “Mark Twain’s Memory-Builder.”
The record company knew it, too, and released it as a single. Result: The song was a hit on country and rock radio stations, turned Daniels into a star, and was named the Country Music Association’s Single of the Year for 1979.
The Artist: Tag Team
The Song: “Whoomp! (There it is)” (1993)
The Story: Cecil “DC, the Brain Supreme” Glenn was a DJ at Atlanta’s Magic City nightclub. He dreamed of producing a hit rap record. One night he heard another DJ chanting into the mike, “Whoomp! There it is!” When Glenn saw the nightclub crowd’s unified response, he knew that was his hit. So he and his best friend, Steve “Roll’n” Gibson, wrote and recorded a song around the phrase.
The song was a hit at the club, but they couldn’t sell it to a major label. So they borrowed $2,500 to press the record themselves and founded a small label called Bellmark Records to distribute it. The song took off immediately, hitting the Billboard Top 10 and has been a staple at sports arenas ever since.
Close Call: Another rap group, 95 South, recorded “Whoot, There It Is” and actually released it a month earlier. So why did Tag Team’s song hit the big time and not 95 South’s? According to Rolling Stone’s Tracy Hopkins, “Tag Team’s version had more crossover appeal. 95 South’s chorus of ‘Tell me where the booty at/Whoot, there it is!’ was just too raunchy.”
The Artist: Julia Ward Howe
The Song: “Battle Hymn of the Republic” (1862)
The Story: At the onset of the Civil War, Howe was riding through the streets of Washington, D.C., with her husband one warm summer night, watching Union troops prepare for battle. One group of men was sitting outside an inn singing a sad folk song that began “John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave.” Howe couldn’t sleep that night. She couldn’t get the tune out of her head. So she tried to think about more uplifting words, and out came:
Q: Why is September 28 special? A: It’s Ask A Stupid Question Day. Thanks for asking!
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored…
Inspired, she got out of bed and stayed up all night finishing the lyrics. A few days later, Howe brought the lyrics to her friend James T. Fields, the editor of Atlantic Monthly. He featured the song in the magazine, where it caught the eye of President Lincoln. Lincoln loved it so much that he adopted “Battle Hymn of the Republic” as the theme song of the Union army.
Irony: “Dixie,” the theme song adopted by Confederate troops, was written by a northerner, Daniel Decatur Emmett, who had never even visited the South.
The Artist: Bob Dylan
The Song: “Like a Rolling Stone” (1965)
The Story: Bob Dylan was fed up with the music business—he was tired of the grueling road
schedule, shady promoters, and pressure to keep churning out hit after hit. So in 1965 he hid away in a little cabin in Woodstock, New York, to regroup. He recounted his experience in the book Bob Dylan: Behind the Shades.
I’d literally quit playing and singing, and I found myself writing this song, this story, this long piece of vomit about twenty pages long, and out of it I took “Like a Rolling Stone.”…The first two lines, which rhymed “kiddin’ you” with “didn’t you” just knocked me out.
Dylan was so impressed with the song that he came out of hiding to record it. It was the first single from his seminal album Highway 61 Revisited and began the second chapter of his legendary career. Not only was it Dylan’s first top 10 hit, peaking at #2, but it was also the first song over six minutes long to reach the Billboard Top 40.
* * *
CELEBRITY GOSSIP
O. J. Simpson was originally cast for the title role in the movie The Terminator but was ultimately rejected because, according to a studio executive, “People would never have believed a nice guy like O. J. could play the part of a ruthless killer.”
Cyndi Lauper’s 1984 hit “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” was written by a man.
DIVORCE, PROSPECTOR-STYLE
When our friend Jeff Cheek dug up this nugget and asked us to assay its value for bathroom reading, we said, “Eureka! It’s a gold mine!”
YOU’RE ALL MINE
John Howard was a prospector in Colorado in the 1860s. When his wife, Mary E. Howard, sued for divorce, John did not contest it. He was unfamiliar with civil law but as a prospector, was well-versed in mining laws. So to make sure that he was completely free of his former wife (and maybe to get a laugh), he sent the Denver City Court of Chancery a “quit-claim” deed to his wife. And he courteously left a blank space for any future husband to fill in his name, if Mary ever remarried.
Uncle John’s Unstoppable Bathroom Reader Page 32