The High Holidays

A belated Happy New Year, to those observing it...and good wishes for Yom Kippur, which begins this evening, at sundown.

More about Ken Burns' "Country Music"

Filmmaker Ken Burns' eight-part documentary, "Country Music," came to a close Wednesday, on PBS.

The program was an exceptional and compelling achievement--historically, visually, musically, emotionally.  

https://www.pbs.org/kenburns/country-music

Ken Burns' "Country Music"

The first two hours of director Ken Burns' latest documentary, "Country Music," aired last night on public television.

The program--further evidence, if any was needed, of Mr. Burns' enormous talent--was terrific.

The next installment of the documentary airs tonight (at least on the public station I watch), followed by episodes on Tuesday and Wednesday; the episodes then continue next week, from Sunday through Wednesday. 

https://www.pbs.org/kenburns/country-music/

Please check your local PBS listings; as suggested above, broadcast scheduling can vary.

The Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention

The annual (and always enjoyable) Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention (a/k/a/ MANC) is taking place this week in Hunt Valley, Maryland.  The convention opened this morning (Thursday), and will be running until Saturday.

https://www.midatlanticnostalgiaconvention.com/

https://www.facebook.com/MidAtlanticNostalgiaConvention/

I've attended the convention several times, but am unable to do so this year.  There are a number of friends who are attending--and I regret I will not be there to see them, and spend time with them.

The publisher of my book about early television, BearManor Media, is represented at the convention; BearManor has, for a number of years, had a table at MANC (along with the convention's other nostalgia-oriented vendors).

Yet while I will not be there, a couple of signed copies of my book are available at the BearManor table (or, at least, were available when the convention opened; I do not know if either has thus far been purchased).

This year, author John C. Abbott is presiding over the BearManor table. Mr. Abbott is the author of multiple books, brought out by BearManor, about the Old-Time Radio series Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar.

Here is the amazon.com page which lists his Johnny Dollar titles:

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=john+c.+abbott+johnny+dollar

On Saturday, at 10:30 a.m., Mr. Abbott will be making a presentation, at the convention, about the radio series.

Another presentation I'd like to mention will take place Friday morning, at 10:00.  Author Garry Berman will be giving a talk about the actress Thelma Todd.

I interviewed Mr. Berman a couple of times, while I was host of an online, nostalgia-oriented radio program (2011-2014); we spoke about two of the enjoyable books he has written. One of the conversations concerned his 2008 book, We're Going to See the Beatles! An Oral History of Beatlemania as Told by the Fans Who Were There (Santa Monica Press). The second interview focused upon his 2011 biography, Perfect Fool: The Life and Career of Ed Wynn (published by BearManor).

http://www.garryberman.com/

Lastly, here is the link to the page of the MANC website which lists this year's talks/seminars:

https://www.midatlanticnostalgiaconvention.com/seminars

September 11th

This is a photograph which was taken on September 11, 2001, but was not published until the next year. The picture, taken by Will Nuñez, appeared in the September 2002 issue of Vanity Fair, with other previously unseen images of the September 11th catastrophe, in an article titled "Two Towers: One Year Later." Mr. Nuñez's photograph also appeared in a book released the same month, Here is New York: A Democracy of Photographs (Scalo Verlag Publishers).

As the caption in Vanity Fair noted, in part: "After the first plane hit Tower One, bond analyst Will Nuñez went to his corner newsstand and bought a $14.99 disposable camera, hoping to record the scene for history's sake.  Minutes later, from his downtown office window, he captured United Flight 175 as it sped toward Tower Two."

(Photograph ©Will Nuñez, and Scalo Verlag Publishers, 2002)

James R. Leavelle, Dallas homicide detective

James Leavelle was a part of one of the country's most historic moments--and one of the world's most memorable and historic photographs.

In 1963--wearing a white Stetson and a tan suit--Mr. Leavelle was one of the Dallas detectives escorting Lee Harvey Oswald, in the basement of the Dallas Police Headquarters, when Oswald was shot by Jack Ruby.  Oswald was handcuffed to Mr. Leavelle, when he was shot.

The remarkable photograph of the shooting--which was awarded a Pulitzer Prize--was taken by Bob Jackson, of the Dallas Times Herald.

Mr. Leavelle died on Thursday; he was 99 years old.

Here is an obituary of Mr. Leavelle, from the New York Times: 

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/29/us/james-leavelle-dead.html

The image, below, is of the front page of the New York Daily News, from Monday, November 25, 1963, the day after Oswald's death.



















The photograph at the bottom of the Daily News page is the Pulitzer-awarded picture by Bob Jackson. The striking, dramatic picture above it, taken as Ruby approached Oswald, was by Jack Beers, of the Dallas Morning News. Mr. Leavelle is at the left, in each photo.

Both pictures have often been cropped, in varying ways, when seen in newspapers, magazines, books, or on television.

Below, for example, is a much wider view of Bob Jackson's photograph, as seen at the center of the front page of The Scranton Tribune:














And this is a broader view of the photograph by Jack Beers:

 

(Photo of the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald, by Bob Jackson, Dallas Times Herald; photo taken just prior to the shooting, by Jack Beers, Dallas Morning News.)

Charlottesville

Two years ago today (August 12, 2017), the two-day "Unite the Right" rallies in Charlottesville, Virginia, attended by neo-Nazis, white supremacists, Klan members, and others from the far-right, culminated in the murder of Heather Heyer, age 32, a counter-protester.

The act of terrorism which killed Ms. Heyer (and injured many others) remains a deeply sad and terrible moment in America's history.

I have mentioned, in previous posts, that I lived in Charlottesville--a beautiful, wonderful city--for several years. I moved there in 1995, to host a radio program; the program ended in 1997, but I stayed in the city until the beginning of 2001.

I think about Charlottesville often.  There are a great many things I enjoyed about living there--including getting to know (because of the radio program) a number of the city's excellent print and broadcast journalists.

One was Hawes Spencer, who during my time in the city was editor of a popular Charlottesville newspaper, the C-Ville Weekly.  He later founded and edited another local weekly, The Hook.  More recently, as a Charlottesville-based freelance writer, his byline has appeared in the New York Times, the Daily Beast and other publications.  He also reports for Virginia public radio, and teaches journalism at Virginia's James Madison University.

In 2018, he brought out an impressive book about what took place in Charlottesville in 2017, titled Summer of Hate: Charlottesville, USA (University of Virginia Press).

https://www.amazon.com/Summer-Hate-Charlottesville-Hawes-Spencer/dp/081394208X/