History Goes to the Movies

Over the weekend, I saw the cinematic historical epic du jour, There Will Be Blood. I highly, highly recommend it for anybody who's interested in Upton Sinclair, oil, sweeping historical epics, late Gilded Age issues and aesthetics, or Daniel Day-Lewis screaming about milkshakes.

Yeah, there's one particular line that's both a perfect metaphor and utterly absurd, and of course whenever my brain hears "milkshake" anymore, I go to one particular song.

Apparently, I'm not the only one, as evidenced by this charming little nugget of YouTube I found today:

I See London, I See France, I See Friday Links

It's been a slowish week here at History is Funny. I blame the cold weather here in New York.

• A Brief History of Pants. But this being a UK publication, what they really mean is "A Brief History of Underwear." (Belfast Telegraph)


• Show that's not actually about history garners the History Channel its largest-ever viewing audience. (B&C) Incidentally, "Life After People" is rerunning this Saturday afternoon if you're interested in seeing it. I'll be honest - I haven't watched the History Channel for anything other than "Human Weapon" in about three months, so I wasn't one of those 5.4 million people. I resolve to do better.


• An Illustrated History of Trepannation (scienceblogs.com) Just so's you know, this article contains some images you probably don't want to look at while eating your lunch.


• Here's more on the film adaptation of A People's History of the United States. (NPR)


• And in case that last link made you realize you like your history via audio, check out the Voice of America's "Making of a Nation" series.


• Photo gallery of famous people who were once cheerleaders. (WMUR via boingboing.net)

What Else Do I Have To Say?

Billy Joel has said that if he hadn't become a musician, he would have wanted to be a history teacher. His secret history-buffitude emerged in the 1989 hit "We Didn't Start the Fire," which was basically a rapid-fire tour through the second half of the 20th century, jam-packed with references to pop culture, politics, sports, and science.

Here are a few awesome tribute sites, which will give you some extra background information on various lines in the song you may have missed or misunderstood:

• Here's a flash video with accompanying images for each reference. (Yeli.us)


• The BBC's in-depth tour of the song.


• Here's one of the many hyperlinked lyric lists that are floating around out there.


• And finally, the fine folks at JibJab.com made an awesome send-up covering everything that happened in 2007. (The name "Mahmoud Ahmadinejad" was MADE for that song, wasn't it?)

Germane and German

And in case you need a bit of light (and I do mean light) reading for the long weekend, LiveJournal user "benchilada" has found a bit o' lit for you:



I tried to use just one-syllable words in this post and have, for the most part, done well, but I think not as well as I could have.

Call Me Friday Links

Not much laugh-out-loud funny to be had this week, but plenty in the way of fascinating stories.

• Fortune Cookies' origins have been traced to Japan. (New York Times)


• Moby Dick's narrator tries his hand at stand-up comedy. (McSweeney's)


• The Library of Congress has just joined flickr. And it's pretty much the awesomest thing ever. A big chunk of what they've put up here is from their FSA/OWI collection, most of it from the 40s, most of it in glorious stylized 40s color. I could waste hours here. (And actually have done.)


• Speaking of the Library of Congress: A set of photo negatives labeled by the LOC as being pictures of Grant's inauguration turn out to be from Lincoln's. (LA Times via A. Lincoln Blog.)


• Again tangentially related to the Library of Congress: Historian Joe Manning has undertaken the project of finding out what happened to many of the children in Lewis Hine's famous photographs of child laborers.


• Vladimir Nabokov wanted his last unpublished manuscript destroyed after his death. It's currently sitting in a bank vault. Should his son respect Nabokov's wishes or those of his readers/scholars/fans/admirers? (Slate)

Here Lies Good Old Fred - A Great Big Rock Fell On His Head

Apocryphal stories about epitaphs abound in popular culture, especially when it comes to well-known entertainers who number among the deceased. There's just something satisfying about the idea of leaving one last great line behind, though it's a scant few, it seems, who actually go through with it.

Contrary to popular belief, Dorothy Parker's grave doesn't say "Excuse my dust." She doesn't actually have one - she was cremated and her ashes were scattered - but apparently the garden where the ashes were eventually scattered thought to add it to the plaque that commemorates her there.

Thanks to Find A Grave, I have found a few verifiable - and funny - epitaphs from various famous folks:

• Mel Blanc's headstone quotes his famous line, "That's All, Folks!", which, if you think about it, is appropriate on many levels.


• Robert Frost's headstone proclaims: "I Had a Lover's Quarrel With the World."


• Spike Milligan's says, "Duirt me leat go raibh me breoite." (Which is Gaelic for "I told you I was sick.")


• And finally, the headstone that prompted this silly search in the first place, game show pioneer Merv Griffin: "I will not be right back after this message."

(The title of this post originates outside the Haunted Mansion ride at the Magic Kingdom. While most of the Disney World rides offer you some distraction while you wait, the headstones that greet the line for this ride are funny in the most corny, silly, mildly twisted way possible.)

History is Sketchy

Those of you in the greater metropolitan New York area may wish to check out the following incredibly awesome comedy show, which has its first performance this week. Kelly's a good friend of mine, and if this show is half as funny as it sounded when she was first conceptualizing it, it will be well worth your five bucks:

Henry Clay Frick Presents: Kelly Buttermore and Greg Wilker Can't Read
From the minds of a history teacher and the daughter of a history teacher comes a show about presidents, panthers, and the difference between Henry Clay and Henry Clay Frick. Join Kelly Buttermore and Greg Wilker for an evening of zany yet educational sketch comedy.

Written and performed by Kelly Buttermore and Greg Wilker
Featuring Jon Bander and Eden Gauteron
Directed by Mark Grenier

Tuesday, January 15th and Tuesday, January 29th at 8:00 pm
@ the Magnet Theater
254 West 29th Street, just off of 8th Avenue
Only $5!
Visit their website or call 212-244-8824 for reservations!

(ed. note - I really, really hope they left in the part about William Howard Taft being the lead singer of the first all-dog rock band.)

I Have Lusted in My Heart for Friday Links

I think maybe I'll just make this the thing I do for Fridays - all the nutty stuff I collect during the week in one tasty little post.

(Listen to me talk like I invented blogging or something...or even like it's not something I've been doing for going on seven years now.)

But forget all that - let's get on with the linkage.

• The Pinky Show Presents: "Thomas Edison Hates Cats" - I can't remember how I stumbled across Pinky, but this kitty's irreverent, well-researched, and creative presentations were part of what inspired me to start a history blog.


• This week in the Onion, Jimmy Carter says "I Got What America Needs Right Here." (Naturally, this is not really Jimmy Carter. Also naturally, it's an Onion op-ed and is thus packed with swears.)


• Speaking of Jimmy Carter, here's the Straight Dope on Jimmy's legendary scrape with a murderous rabbit. And him without a Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.


• Cracked.com presents Five popular brands that originated with the Nazis. Being a humor site first and foremost, Cracked doesn't always do the most meticulous research, but they're almost always hilarious.


• Did a radio broadcaster mistakenly refer to Herbert Hoover as "Hoobert Heever"? Snopes knows the answer.

Steampunk Drive-by Shooting

Certainly there is not much to laugh at when it comes to the extermination of the bison in the American West.

I found this image from Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper today. It shows men shooting at buffalo (eh, bison, buffalo, only extreme zoology pedants will get up in my grill about it) from the windows of a train - an exceptionally stupid and cruel stunt inflicted by a people already well-known for their stupidity and cruelty.

But stupid and cruel though it is, I still got a pretty dark chuckle out of it, especially having recently seen Will Smith using a Ford Shelby Mustang to hunt deer in Manhattan in I Am Legend. Call this the predecessor if you will.

One for the ladies

Over at the Freakonomics blog today, there's some great betting-themed analysis of Hillary Clinton's New Hampshire primary victory, with bonus comparisons to Truman and Dewey. Though I'm an Obama girl myself, I'm a presidential trivia nerd first and foremost, so I think the outcome will be fascinating no matter who wins it all.

Also, discussion over there has inspired me to do a little extra research on female presidential candidates, which led me to this list of female candidates, worldwide, since 1870.

Links Galore

A couple of new articles are in the works, but for now, just enjoy this slice of the latest interesting, absorbing, and just plain weird history-related news items:

• Why are folks so fond of 'weird history'? (Sydney Morning Herald) - that's "weird" as in "a little nutty and probably bogus", not weird as in bizarre.


• The many adventures of fictional explorer Tintin, and his many resulting head injuries, likely caused hormonal imbalances. (ABC for Kids)


• Joe Ellis on his favorite founding father: "[T]he one that I want to have a beer with is John Adams. Maybe we'll have a Sam Adams together." (Bloomberg)


• British historian sees Johnny Depp as the ideal actor to play Stalin. (Russia-IC)


• The assassination of Benazir Bhutto sparks this interesting analysis of assassinations in history. (Daily Press)


• An oldie but a goodie: Richard Nixon used the wrong "Wilson Desk" in the White House. (Snopes)

Also, did you catch the new PBS documentary Andrew Jackson: Good, Evil, and the Presidency on Wednesday? I'll keep my eyes open for a re-airing, and if I find anything out, I'll let you know. It was fun, but woefully low on badassery.