Capitol Hill Blue Forums Hot Topics & Breaking News The RoundTable Round Table for the Week of August 29th, 2010

This Week in History

August 29th

1886 - Li Hung-Chang’s chef devised a tasty dish in New York City. It satisfied both American and Oriental tastes. The delicacy was called chop suey. Hung-Chang was China’s Ambassador to the United States.

1966 - Mia Farrow withdrew from the cast of the ABC-TV prime time drama Peyton Place, after starring for two years. With Farrow’s exit, her character, Allison, was dropped.





August 30th

1905 - Ty Cobb appeared in his first major-league baseball game. He played for the Detroit Tigers.

1965 - After 40 years in baseball, Casey Stengel announced his retirement.





August 31st

1940 - Actor Lawrence Olivier and actress Vivian Leigh were married.

1997 - Diana, Britain’s Princess of Wales, was killed in an early-morning car crash in Paris, France. Also killed was her millionaire companion, Harrods department store heir, Dodi Fayed.

September 1st

1972 - America’s Bobby Fischer beat Russia’s Boris Spassky to become world chess champion. The chess match took place in Reykjavik, Iceland.

1992 - Chess champ Bobby Fischer came out of his 20-year retirement to hold a press conference in Yugoslavia. He spit on an order from the U.S. Treasury Department warning him of his pending violation of U.N. sanctions if he played chess in Yugoslavia. Fischer announced that he would, indeed, play his one-time rival, Boris Spassky, in a $5-million chess match in Sveti Stefan, Yugoslavia -- despite the sanctions. The match began on Sep 30th and ran thru Nov 11th. Fischer won.

September 2nd

1924 - Theatregoers heard the song "Indian Love Call" for the first time in the operetta "Rose Marie", which opened in New York City.





1945 - U.S. President Harry S Truman proclaimed this day as Victory-over-Japan Day (V-J Day or Victory Day). It was so named because the official ratification of the Japanese surrender to the Allies was made aboard the "USS Missouri" in Tokyo Bay on this day (Far Eastern Time). The informal agreement of surrender had been made on August 14th.

September 3rd

1783 - The Revolutionary War ended on this day. A treaty was signed by Great Britain and the United States in Paris, France. The treaty bears the signatures of Benjamin Franklin, John Adams and John Jay.

1895 - The first professional football game was played -- in Latrobe, PA. The Latrobe YMCA defeated the Jeannette Athletic Club 12-0. Since 1967, St. Vincent College in Latrobe has been the home of the Pittsburgh Steelers training camp.

September 4th

1781 - Los Angeles, California was born. The Mexican Provincial Governor, Felipe de Neve, founded El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de Los Angeles, originally named Nuestra Senora la Reina de Los Angeles de Porciuncula, by Gaspar de Portola, a Spanish army captain and Juan Crespi, a Franciscan priest, who had noticed the beautiful area as they traveled north from San Diego in 1769. El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de Los Angeles translates into the Village of our Lady, the Queen of the Angels ... L.A. for short.

1972 - Swimmer Mark Spitz captured his seventh Olympic gold medal in the 400-meter medley relay event at Munich, Germany. Spitz became the first Olympian to win seven gold medals.

The roller coaster photos bring back memories. The new ones may be flashier and prettier, but the old ones really scared the heck out you. In many instances you were taking your life in your hands. Others you just got beat up more, but the free fall was exhilarating. You knew when you rode the old Savin Rock roller coaster that you were on a roller coaster. The frame/structure supported the rails and cars were all wood and the click clack and sounds prepared you for the first dip. Nothing wimpy about it, fer sure. With the new ones that I rode: all I can say is that the thrill is gone.

Thanks, Naomi. I love roller coasters, the other amusement rides, and Jacques Brel. It was also fun visiting the TV Peyton Place. I watch the movie every year on Labor Day and have memories of a friend showing me passages from the book when were pre-teens. It was the Rodney/Allison scene at the prom. We were hiding in a phone booth in a drugstore in Langley Park, MD. We'd taken the paperback off a rack and didn't want anyone to see us reading it.

Joe, I've ridden one of the old wooden roller coasters, the one in Long Beach, CA, that starts on the beach and loops out over the water. I was around ten, and my parents had taken me to see Disneyland—probably about two weeks after it opened. My father took me on the LB roller coaster, the first one I'd ever been on. We reached the top of the first "hill," and he said casually that I might want to hold on When the ride ended, he was missing three buttons from his shirt. Guess I did hold on.

This was my first rollercoaster, the Pike in Long Beach.

Scary, noisy, jerk and shake ride that I was sure led to death.

And then I wanted to get on again.

I guess that you did hold on! There was another ride at Savin Rock called the Wild Mouse. The structure supporting the car/mouse was metal, but it was more dangerous than the wooden roller coaster. The Wild Mouse ride was located next to the Carousel overlooking the water. It didn't put your stomach up in your throat like the roller coaster, but you knew that you were on a ride, even though the "hills" and "dips" weren't all that much. The safety problem resulted from a design flaw or possibly even physics. The "mouse" would bang an almost 90 degree turn. One of the turns overlooked the water, and a car or two went off the tracks and into the water tragically resulting in some fatalities.

It's state, county, and local fair time again. Anyone- besides me- remember the B-52 ride? How about cotton candy? It was a big deal when you were a kid.

I love roller coasters, especially the ones at Disneyland and Walt Disney World.

Well, stop the ride, I want to get off.
Why just this morning I read that the FDA is getting ready to inspect all large egg farms.

This pattern of Obama interfering with business has got to stop.
If this is allowed to continue, we might see FDA inspectors showing up at MEAT processing plants next!

Why does Obama hate America?

Cedar Point in Sandusky,Ohio is the Mecca of Roller Coaster
I rode front seat on the Magnum XL200.

I rode a Wild Mouse carnival ride about 50 years ago joe, it was a rickety scary old thing, partly wood and partly metal, looked like it was going to collapse any minute.