DFHC 2/22/2012

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Breakfast at Ask Cool Daddy’s

Dear Cool Daddy: Of all the cartoon “spokesmen” for breakfast cereals back in the 1950s and 60s, which was most likely gay? How’s that for an off-the-wall question?    …Hazel Ann, in Albuquerque

Dear Hazel Ann: Off-the-chart off-the-wall, I’d say. Here at Ask Cool Daddy, we do try to keep an open mind…but what a politically incorrect question, you rascal, you. I mean, I think it’s politically incorrect…its so hard to keep up these days on how and what “you’re supposed to think.”  It would probably be easier for everyone to just think for themselves, but we got the system we got, nez pah?  But it sure is curious that while on the one hand its OK to be gay, on the other hand its not OK to be interested in who is or isn’t.  Ask for example “Was Nixon gay?” and you’re likely to get the indignant answer “What difference does it make?”…and of course that’s from heteros (or as my spellchecker insists on calling us, “heaters”) since almost everybody is, despite what you hear.

Baby Boomers will recall that back in the day, there was a small number of performers who carved a show business niche for themselves by camping it up for laughs. I’m thinking of Paul Lynde, Charles Nelson Reilly, Alan Sues, Harvey Korman, Rip Taylor, Louis Nye, and the like. None were openly gay, at least to the public…Liberace probability came the closest, especially in the later decades, altho in the 1950s he sued a British newspaper…and won…when they suggested that he was.  Hollywood insiders knew who, but to varying degrees since like anything else, some were more quiet about it than others. For the record, of those I mentioned, the first 3 were, Korman and Taylor are widely considered to be but never publicly fessed up, and Louis Nye wasn’t. The idea that a straight man could also be sort of effeminate…like a Jack Benny for example…seems to have gone by the boards.

At any rate, to answer your question…I’d have to say it’s Lovable Truly, the Post Alpha-Bits mailman from 1964 thru 1971. I mean even in those innocent days…when most Baby Boomers assumed that Truman Capote just talked funny, that’s all…you didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to know that was a mighty peculiar name for a guy. What were the ad-men thinking? Based perhaps on the complementary closing of a letter…”Very truly yours” morphed with “Love, so-and-so”? He was overhauled several times, getting wider shoulders and a broader chest, but that didn’t help. And what kind of a mailman likes dogs? Something definitely wasn’t right.

But Lovable Truly seemed popular enough with kids…all the standard stuff…dolls, coloring books, even a halloween costume. And he was seen on the Linus the Lionhearted Saturday morning cartoon show, even staring in some of his own features, voiced by Bob McFadden, also known for Milton the Monster, Cool McCool, and Franken Berry, among others. But anyhow, you asked, I answered. Honorary mention to the short-lived Mr. Wonderfull Surprize (1972) and that extremely strange Twinkles Sprinkler (1965)…

But speaking of icons…

Wicked Ballsy….

You might recall Kellogg’s early 1960s run at Big G’s Cheerios…I actually remember OKs tasting pretty good, and I wasn’t a big Cheerios fan, altho I’ve come to appreciate them in my old age. Less well remembered is Post’s try, which ideally was supposed to be shaped like little hearts, but ended up pretty much triangular…BTW, that Lion came before Linus and was a different lion…just for the record…

the goodness and oats and corn in shameless wheat and rice plugs…

Podcasts at http://stolfpod.podbean.com  and   http://thewholething.podbean.com

Deep Fried Hoods Cups Daily Blog:    http://deepfriedhoodsiecups.wordpress.com/

Other Daily Blog at http://stolf.wordpress.com  (the legendary Stolf’s Blog)

More bloggage at  http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com  and  http://www.examiner.com/retro-pop-culture-in-watertown/mark-john-astolfi

Resume at http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com/p/resume.html

Audio samples at  http://stolfspots.podbean.com

G4BB 54: Whatchamacallits…

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Whatchamacallits…

Dear G4BB: I saw this in a recent Dear Abby column…her answer was OK, but I figured I’d submit it to you in case “Mixed Up in Wisconsin” could use a second opinion!  …from Roger, in Racine

55.1  Dear Roger: Yeah, I saw it too…and don’t mind if I do! Altho the specific question Mixed Up asks…how to introduce the boyfriend to others…reminded me of a cartoon from the early 1970s, when the idea of 2 people “living together” was becoming more socially acceptable…but before we had settled on the politically correct but nonetheless goofy term “significant other.”  An older woman is introducing a younger couple to another older woman, and she says: “And this is Sharon’s whatchamacallit.” 

55.2  And yes, Abby Jr.’s answer is just common sense…this is my friend, my boyfriend, my fiancé… however along they are in the relationship. People today have been cowered (by that drat Media again?) into thinking you need “full disclosure” for every nook and cranny of your existence…and it simply isn’t so…too much information!, right?

55.3  On the other hand, the real point of the question…which Abby Jr. ignores, due no doubt to space limitations…is when Mixed Up’s sister says: This is my sister and her boyfriend, my nephew. After all, in the normal course of events, your sister’s nephew is also your nephew…or worse, your son…so yeah, eyebrows are raised, looks trend towards askance.

55.4  The topic of how one should act towards one’s affines…those one is related to by marriage…is a broad one, and a thoroughgoing examination of it is more than I have time for these days…yes, it’s certainly on my bucket list!  Across time and space as I like to say, there are innumerable sets of rules and restrictions, customs and interpretations.  And altho this really isn’t relevant, I might mention something I was reading about recently…in many kinship systems, the practice of a marriage “exchange” has been and still is followed…that is, the bride’s family gets something from the groom’s family in exchange for losing their daughter. For one tribe in Papua New Guinea, it’s traditionally a pig, called the “bride’s fat.” The parents can’t eat it, because they’d be eating their own “daughter,” but others in the family can…so it goes, nez pah?

55.5  Now strictly speaking, “-in-law” is seldom tacked onto anything beyond brother, sister, mother, father, son, and daughter. Certainly, we all understand what an “uncle-in-law” or a “cousin-in-law” would be, but you seldom hear it said that way…usually it’s just “my husband’s uncle” or “my wife’s cousin.” What’s more complicated is how a spouse thinks of his spouse’s blood relatives…cultures differ, families, differ, and even couples differ…you might consider your husband’s cousins as “your cousins,” but he might not feel the same about yours.

55.6  With respect to who can marry whom, legal limitations have usually followed religious ones. An illuminating example comes from England. In 1842, a bill was introduced in Parliament to allow a man to marry his dead wife’s sister. The the idea was that it would be beneficial for the aunt to raise the man’s children. The bill was soundly defeated, but it touched off over 60 years of social debate…needless to say, religion and morality entered into it, and there were strong opinions on both sides.

55.7  If you’re a Gilbert and Sullivan fan, you might recall in Iolanthe when the Fairy Queen sings “He shall prick that annual blister, marriage with deceased wife’s sister.” Finally, the “Deceased Wife’s Sister’s Marriage Act” was passed in 1907, altho it was strictly stated that a clergyman could as we say today “opt out” from marrying a couple, if his religious beliefs prohibited it. But still, this law was very specific, and was not a blanket approval for all siblings and siblings-in-law. The “Deceased Brother’s Widow’s Marriage Act” had to wait until 1921, and it was another 10 years until you could marry your dead spouse’s niece or nephew…which brings us back around to Mixed up in Wisconsin, altho that isn’t really her case…

55.8  Because strictly speaking, Jared the “nephew” isn’t Mixed Up’s in-law…your in-laws are the blood relatives of your spouse (but not your spouse’s affines…say your spouse’s sister’s husband…otherwise, it could conceivably spread to everyone!) The reason the unmarried Mixed Up has a brother-in-law at all is because her sister is married…and from her sister’s husband’s point of view, Mixed Up is his sibling-in-law, thus he is also hers. But for example, his parents are not parents-in-law to Mixed Up, only to her sister. Granted, when and if Mixed Up marries the nephew, her father-in-law will indeed be her sister’s brother-in-law, but let’s not jump the gun.

55.9  But to be honest here…Mixed Up apparently likes the drama, otherwise she wouldn’t be worrying about the whiff of “i-word.” Anyone in the family…or close to them…knows they aren’t related, and anyone else will understand that quickly enough. Which is not to say that some…her sister perhaps?…might extend the definition of “i-word” beyond what it actually is, but that’s family for you. Remember the old saying…you can’t trim the wind, you can only trim your sails.

55.10  And regardless of whether anybody actually cares who’s what, the sister is perfectly within her rights to abbreviate “my husband’s nephew” to “my nephew” for the sake of simplicity. This is the way we do things…for example, on The Andy Griffith Show, “Aunt” Bee refers to both Andy (her 1st cousin once removed) and Andy’s son Opie (her 1st cousin twice removed) as her “nephew.” That’s fine…until you start constructing a family tree, then precision is key, obviously.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

55.11  In fact, this whole discussion reminds me of a puzzle I posed back in G4BB 3…and solved in G4BB 4…that of Tony Soprano’s “nephew” Christopher. (The chart below is not my work so is thus un-numbered, altho I did add in the identifying photos…can it really be only 5 years this June since The Sopranos series ended? Seems longer somehow…)

55.12 When the show took place, Tony’s wife Carmela’s 1st cousin on her father’s side, “Cousin Dickie,” was dead…and his son Christopher had been “adopted” as Tony’s right-hand man and heir apparent…altho if you recall, that’s not exactly how things turned out. She called Chris her “cousin”…as opposed to “1st cousin once removed”…fair enough. She also referred to Chris and her daughter Meadow as “the cousins”…and Chris and Meadow called each other “cousin”…altho of course here it’s 2nd cousin, not 1st.

55.13  But at the same time, Tony called Chris his “nephew”…a double “mistake” if you will, since the relationship was his wife’s, not his…and then also it’s not nephew but 1st cousin once removed, since Chris’ father was her 1st cousin, not her brother…altho remember, some cultures call that a “2nd nephew” which makes eminent sense, sez me. My challenge was to find a way, without interbreeding if you please, that one and the same person could be your nephew and your wife’s 1st cousin.

55.14  The answer hinges on the fact…and by now I hope this sprung instantly to your mind!!…that we all have 2 sides to our family, owing to the fact that we have 2 parents…and normally those 2 sides aren’t related. But what’s instructive to note is that the solution diagrammed in Chart 189 could come about via 2 different chain of events.

55.15  The way I did it was: your brother marries and has a son, your nephew. That nephew has a 1st cousin Zelda on his mother’s side…and you marry Zelda…badda-bing, badda-boom. But you could do the same thing “backwards” as follows: you marry Zelda, then your brother marries Zelda’s aunt (Zelda’s mother Alice’s sister) and has a son…again, your nephew and your wife’s 1st cousin. Next time, the mailbag still giveth…till then, peace out…

________________________________________

Copyright © 2012 Mark John Astolfi, All Rights Reserved

shameless plugs-in-law, but we love them like they were our own…

Podcasts at http://stolfpod.podbean.com  and   http://thewholething.podbean.com

Other Daily Blog at http://stolf.wordpress.com  (the legendary Stolf’s Blog)

More bloggage at  http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com

and  http://www.examiner.com/retro-pop-culture-in-watertown/mark-john-astolfi

Updated Resume at http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com/p/resume.html

Audio samples at  http://stolfspots.podbean.com

DFHC 2/15/2012

>>  don’t forget to check out Stolf’s Blog …and you’ll always have good luck!…  <<

A Better Life Thru Asking Cool Daddy

Dear Cool Daddy: My pharmacist said that heroin was once available over the counter…that can’t be right, can it? He’s always pulling my leg about one thing or another.  …from Huggy Bear, in Salt Lake City

Dear H.B.: But in this case, no legs are being pulled. Diacetylmorphine, a.k.a. Heroin…and we’ll capitalize the word since it was a trademark…was developed by the Bayer Pharmaceutical Company of Germany in the late 1800s as a cough suppressant and cure for morphine addiction. Altho also derived from the opium poppy, it was believed to be non-addictive…such was the level of study and testing in those far off days.

It was marketed in the US right alongside Aspirin, and available from 1896 thru about 1910, when it was finally realized to be indeed addictive…metabolizing into morphine in the liver…in fact, it could thus be described as a “fast-acting” form of morphine. This was, needless to say, a terrible blunder on Bayer’s part, and a major embarrassment …altho the firm survived, obviously. And by 1914, the Harrison Act came along, which immediately took morphine, opium, codeine, cocaine, and their many and varied derivatives and compounds, off the drug store shelves for good…no longer available from Sears Roebuck by mail-order either. Marijuana was added to the list in 1937.

But speaking of A Better Life Thru Chemistry, here are several ads from the 1950s you might find amusing…

WICKED BALLSY

And speaking of drugs, what were they smoking at the advertising agency…coming up with “living” blue ribbons? I mean, how could they even walk, let alone go bowling?

diethyltriptoshameless plugozine…take several daily, or as needed…

Podcasts at http://stolfpod.podbean.com  and   http://thewholething.podbean.com

Deep Fried Hoods Cups Daily Blog:    http://deepfriedhoodsiecups.wordpress.com/

Other Daily Blog at http://stolf.wordpress.com  (the legendary Stolf’s Blog)

More bloggage at  http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com  and  http://www.examiner.com/retro-pop-culture-in-watertown/mark-john-astolfi

Resume at http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com/p/resume.html

Audio samples at  http://stolfspots.podbean.com

G4BB 54: Mail-o-Rama-o-Jama

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»»»  Mail-o-Rama-Jama  «««

Dear G4BB: So what’s the dang deal with Romney saying he’d deport the President’s uncle? I wish the Sunday paper had a special section every week on genealogy and kinship topics.  …from Natalie, in Natal, South Africa

54.1  Dear Natalie: I hear ya! Well for now, it’s G4BB  or nothing, huh? But, yeah, “Unclegate” anyone? Altho I must tell you quite frankly, this is not a subject I have the heart to delve into very deeply. As someone once said, “Where the Sun is worshiped as a God, it is not a good idea to investigate the laws of heat”…if I ain’t being too oblique on the subject, and I don’t think I am. What’s that? The Secret Service at the door? Tell them I’m not home. 

54.2  But since you asked, the “uncle” in question is actually the POTUS’ half-uncle, being the half-brother of his late father, Barrack Obama Sr. He was born in Kenya as Omar Okech Obama, and came to live in the US in 1963. He is currently 67 years old, and calls himself Onyango Obama, after his father.  He was in the news due to a drunk driving arrest in August of last year, when it came to light that he had been ordered deported back in 1992. If you care to investigate the details of how and why he’s still here (as I said, I simply don’t), they are readily available all over the net.

54.3  Of course, it was a typically snarky “gotcha” question to pose to Mitt Romney back in December, and his answer…that our nation’s immigration laws ought to be enforced… was essentially sound. It’s not unreasonable on the surface of it to think that someone ordered deported ought to pretty much just go…allowing that the specific details of the case might be more complicated, and ultimately result in a different resolution. But in answer to the question: “If somebody is ordered deported, should they be deported, yes or no?” I’d say “yes,” if those were the only 2 answers allowed, wouldn’t you? Hence, there’s really no story here, from the point of view of Romney anyway.

54.4  For the record, the above is a chart of BHO’s family…it is not my work, except that for your benefit I have colored his father red, his half-uncle green, and his grandfather blue. It is fully explained at this website. I gratefully thank Doctor Zebra, and hope you will find it enlightening.

54.5  But I must say, if Romney is indeed the candidate, and his polygamous forebears are reported in the Media like it’s the end of the world, it will indeed be a case of the pot calling the kettle black (sorry…couldn’t resist.) Strange days ahead, it seems…

54.6  And as an interesting side note to last week’s look at Romney’s plural marriage heritage, I was gratified to open the paper last Sunday to this story, cosmic coincidences notwithstanding… But next, a couple of queries left over from the holidays.

Dear G4BB: Why doesn’t my 2nd cousin Fred ever come to my Christmas party?  …from Bewildered in Bermuda

54.7  Dear Bewildered: Because you’re a dope and nobody goes to your parties. Haven’t you noticed that you’re eating hors d’oeuvres for lunch for 3 days, year in and year out?  OK, just kidding wichoo…sorry…serious answer…

54.8  It’s probably because, if you’re the type of family that goes so far as to invite 2nd cousins…in addition to presumably 1st cousins and siblings…to your Yuletide wingdings, there are simply too many parties for anyone to attend all of them.

54.9  As indicated by the green arrows in Chart 185, you have 4 distinct sets of 2nd cousins, each set consisting of descendants of the siblings of your 4 grandparents…which is to say, each consisting of the great grandchildren of your 4 sets of great grandparents.  Fred has the same…and this amounts to 7 sets of relatives, since by virtue of you’re being 2nd cousins, one of yours and one of Fred’s are the same. So even if Christmas parties were limited to 2nd cousin reunions, there would be 7 parties, 3 you’d go to, 3 Fred would go to, and one you’d both go to.

54.10  And it would build up fast…for 3rd cousins, 15 parties…4th cousins, 31 parties…5th cousins, 63 parties…altho at that level, you could have Christmas every weekend of the year, with parties to spare…so I guess we have a happy ending after all, nez pah?

Dear G4BB: I am 11 years old. On New Years Day, my uncle told me that somebody born in 2012 can be older than someone born in 2011. I think he has it backwards, but all he says to me is to keep thinking about it some more. I’m tired of thinking about it some more. Can you help me with the answer?  …from Freedom Ann in Fresno

54.11  Dear F.A.: Don’t be mad at your uncle, he’s just being his old avuncular self, I suspect. But what he’s driving at is the generally overlooked fact that the day and year of one’s birth is always recorded according to local time. So what? So things can get a little tangled up right around the time when the year changes, the night of Dec. 31st/Jan. 1st.

54.12  In Chart 186, we see that a little girl named Amy is born in Nags Head, North Carolina at one minute past midnight, the morning of January 1, 2012. At that very moment, where you live in Fresno, California, it is 3 hours earlier, right? Now let’s move ahead 1 hour…

54.13  It’s now 1 hour later, and a little girl named Zoë is born where you are, in Fresno. As you can see Amy is 1 hour older than Zoë, even tho Amy was born in the next year. So if you have a list of people born in 2011 and a list of people born in 2012, most of the people on the 2011 list will be older than everybody on the 2012 list…but a few won’t be! A few on the 2011 list will be younger than a few on the 2012 list. And if you find someone born on Dec 31st, and someone else on Jan 1st of the next year, you can’t assume the first one is older! It’s all thanks to Time Zones.

54.14  Also, Zoë will celebrate her 1st birthday one day before Amy does..12/31/2012 for Zoë, 1/1/2013 for Amy…even tho Amy was born first and is thus older, if only by an hour.

54.15  But the most interesting thing is, in another 18 years, Amy and Zoë will be college roommates at Tufts University…tell your uncle that! Next week, we’re still nowhere near the bottom of that bottomless mailbag…adios…

________________________________________

Copyright © 2012 Mark John Astolfi, All Rights Reserved

shameless plugs, declining the invitation owing to a subsequent engagement…

Podcasts at http://stolfpod.podbean.com  and   http://thewholething.podbean.com

Other Daily Blog at http://stolf.wordpress.com  (the legendary Stolf’s Blog)

More bloggage at  http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com

and  http://www.examiner.com/retro-pop-culture-in-watertown/mark-john-astolfi

Updated Resume at http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com/p/resume.html

Audio samples at  http://stolfspots.podbean.com

DFHC 2/8/2012

>>  don’t forget to check out Stolf’s Blog  …and you’ll always have good luck!…  <<

Dear Cool Daddy’s Chex in the Mail

Dear Cool Daddy: I saw this recently in the Wall Street Journal…I remember Chex taking off like gangbusters in the 1950s and 60s, but does it really date back to the 1930s?  …from Casper, in Sugartown

Dear Casper: Well, it sort of does…how’s that for a definitive declaration?  I might mention that the suggestion that “from about 1916 to 1948, manufacturers didn’t introduce many new cereals” is an urban myth…as erroneously said of cereals as it is of virtually every other mass consumable category.

They tried to pull that one regarding Wrigley’s gum a while back, claiming there was only Doublemint, Spearmint, and Juicy Fruit until Big Red in 1976. Nothing could be further from the truth, and I called them on it, providing a good 2 dozen examples, and they printed a clarification, altho I wasn’t named…probably others caught the gaff too. Certainly, there wasn’t the avalanche of new cereals that began in the 1960s, and accelerated in the 1970s and 80s…but there was always a lot of experimentation, and since there were many more manufacturers in the first half of the 20th century, I wonder which way the ultimate totals (no pun intended) might tip.

At any event, here’s the dope: Starting around 1900, Ralston Purina made a phenomenally popular hot wheat cereal, at various times called Ralston “Health Food, “Wheat Food,” and “Breakfast Food.” By the 1930s, it was Ralston Cereal, or just “Ralston” for short…and was soon joined by a quick-cooking “Instant Ralston” variety. Next came a ready-to-eat product called Shredded Ralston, essentially bite-size shredded wheat biscuits. That’s the 1935  as stated in the above WSJ clipping…I have seen 1936 and 1937 also cited, and the first advertising I can find dates from 1938. It too was a success, so now we jump ahead to the Summer of 1951.

To coincide with the introduction of Rice Chex, Shredded Ralston is renamed Wheat Chex. (The iconic Chex trio would be rounded out by Corn Chex in 1959.) As you can see above, the box uses both names to alert the consumer…the phrase “the NEW Shredded Ralston” means the name and packaging,  as the advertising copy also refers to Wheat Chex as “the cereal you’ve known as Shredded Ralston.”  So that’s the short answer: the cereal dates back to the late 1930s, the Chex name to 1951.

But we can’t stop there…the real question is how and when did (A) and (B) above morph into the current (C)? Indeed, Wheat Chex was one of my breakfast favorites as a kid, and I remember dense, crunchy striated pillows…not the wimpy criss-cross squares of today. Working from illustrations found in advertisements and trade dress, there appears to have been a gradual evolution.

Wicked Ballsy

The name “Shredded Ralston” was gone from the Wheat Chex box within a year or so…but it’s interesting to note that Rice Chex was for several years still referred to as “shredded rice,” as seen in these 2 newspaper ads from 1952…

shamlessed plug chex…

Podcasts at http://stolfpod.podbean.com  and   http://thewholething.podbean.com

Deep Fried Hoods Cups Daily Blog:    http://deepfriedhoodsiecups.wordpress.com/

Other Daily Blog at http://stolf.wordpress.com  (the legendary Stolf’s Blog)

More bloggage at  http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com  and  http://www.examiner.com/retro-pop-culture-in-watertown/mark-john-astolfi

Resume at http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com/p/resume.html

Audio samples at  http://stolfspots.podbean.com

G4BB 53: Can-o-Worms!

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≈≈≈≈≈≈≈   Can-o-Worms!   ≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

Dear G4BB: I read in the paper that Mitt Romney is related to the Bushes…10C 1R to 41 and 10C 2R to 43…did they get that right?   …Greenie, in Stickemsville

Dear G4BB: Now that it’s looking like Romney vs Obama this November, I’m wondering about the talk of polygamy in his family tree…is it for real? And if so, just a footnote, or significant?  …Lola, in Damnyankeesburg

53.1  It seemed natural to lump these 2 questions together. In answer to the first, the Bush-Romney connection comes from the folks at Ancestry.com…and as far as I can tell, it checks out. Trouble is, this once again highlights a major flaw in our kinship terminology.  If I were to say Abe is Zack’s uncle, this positions them precisely in their family tree: they have a common ancestor…Abe’s father and Zack’s grandfather, who of course is also the father of Zack’s father. Abe is “closer” to this common ancestor than Zack is…1 generation for Abe, 2 generations for Zack. All neat and tidy, nez pah?

53.2  Sadly, not so if Abe and Zack were 1st cousins once removed…again, they have a common ancestor, and because of the “removed,” one is closer to that ancestor than the other. But there is no way to know which! Genealogists solve this problem by calling the closer one “ascending,” and the other one “descending,” but it’s a cumbersome system, not used in general parlance.

53.3  Now considering the Bushes and Romneys…suppose all we knew was that Mitt and 41 were 10C 1R…there would be 2 possibilities, depending on which was ascending and which descending. In other words, given 2 individuals who are 10C 1R, we know that one is the 10th cousin of the other’s father, we just don’t know which.

53.4  Fortunately, in this case people who understand kinship do know which, because 41′s son 43 is Mitt’s 10C 2R, so Mitt must be ascending…if he were descending, he and 43 would be 11th cousins, the sons of 10th cousins. Mind you, this is just a “serving suggestion” to demonstrate how it works…the common ancestor is religious rights crusader Ann Marbury Hutchinson, but her line could be thru one or both of the mothers, not fathers…which it actually is I leave to you as an exercise, as they used to say to school.

53.5  But God bless computers in general and the internet in particular…the profusion of genealogical data has made such discoveries a thousand times more accessible. Remember when Bush 43 and John Kerry were announced as 9C 2R*? And in this case, we did know the lines…Kerry was indeed the 9th cousin of 43′s grandfather Prescott. And Obama and McCain were, at the very least, both 22C 2R and 24C 6 R…but recall, everybody alive today is at least 50th cousin to everybody else, so that’s midway

* I hate to show off, but what can you do…they were also 10C 1R 2 ways…10C 2R…11C 1R…12C 1R…12C 2R…14C…and who knows what else. BTW, this is said to be typical for any 2 living individuals with colonial New England forebears. 

≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

53.6  As to the issue of polygamy, it’s worm-time, folks! For the brainless Media, the rule is “If it bleeds, it leads.” And they also operate on the nonsensical principle that if a relative of yours does something gnarly, well, you must be guilty too…they won’t come out and say it, but wink wink, nudge nudge. It could be a parent, a sibling, a niece or cousin, or even a long distant ancestor…doesn’t matter…gotcha!!!!

53.7  I saw this one commentary…well, I have to admit it was good to see an old-fashioned word like “rife” being utilized…but what can one make of this: “Polygamy has been absent in his family background for more than two generations.” Does that mean “3 generations” or something else? And where do you start counting generations, with Mitt or with his father? What an utterly useless statement…and shabby journalism to boot.

53.8  Here’s what they should have said: “The last occurrence of polygamy was in Mitt Romney’s great grandfather’s generation.”  See there, now you know something!

53.9  But in answer to the question, it is far from a footnote in the family history, but central to the whole story of Mitt’s line. Why was Mitt’s father George born in Chihuahua, Mexico? Because George’s father Gaskell Romney had resettled there with his polygamous parents in 1884, to escape religious persecution in the US…one of 9 Mormon sanctuaries or “colonies” established across the border. (2 still exist today.)  You may recall that the LDS Church elders ultimately issued their anti-polygamy “Manifesto” in 1890, the price they were willing to pay for Utah statehood. Mitt’s family returned to Utah in 1912.

53.10  What’s really wormy is that polygamous relationships still exist in the US, flying at various levels under the radar, depending on the place…and in a time when there is such a push to redefine marriage as something beyond the traditional one man/one woman, they must wonder what sort of social justice allows their honest beliefs to be ignored, if not outright condemned. At any rate, should Romney become the candidate, all this will be dissected in salacious detail, you betcha. Still, history is history, and I find it fascinating…while oddly enough feeling not the slightest urge to be judgmental…but that’s just me.

53.11  So Chart 184 gives you a simplified overview. Mitt’s 2G grandfather Miles Romney was born in England, and interestingly converted to Mormonism 2 years before emigrating to the US. His wives and children are marked with an asterisk because there is some dispute. Church records list 12 wives, but uncharacteristically there are no further details as to wives or children, leading some researchers to believe this is an error. The Salt Lake Tribune reports there were 6 polygamists in Mitt’s family, and they counted 41 wives. I found all 6, and granting Miles 12, I count 39 wives. It should also be mentioned that engaging in plural marriages was not an individual’s choice, but decided for you by LDS Church elders.

53.12  Other notes: I’m guessing Mitt’s Uncle Lawrence had a middle name, but I didn’t find it. His sister Jane’s middle name appears to be a re-spelling of their mother’s maiden name. Mitt and Jon Huntsman’s father are 3rd cousins, making the 2 candidates 3C 1R. And yeah, I’m sure Obama comes in there somewhere…we’ll see, won’t we? Next week, more from the bottomless mailbag…peace and love.

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Copyright © 2012 Mark John Astolfi, All Rights Reserved

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DFHC 2/1/2012

>>  don’t forget to check out Stolf’s Blog  …I’m countin’ on y’all…  <<

Ask Cool DABBA

Dear Cool Daddy: As a monster ABBA fan, imagine my glee to see this on the net: ABBA to Release First New Song in 18 Years…I didn’t even know they were back together! What’s the skinny, Minnie?  … from Yohan in Hootersburg

Dear Yohan: Hate to have to burst your bubble, my man, but they didn’t get back together, so technically there is no “new” song, despite the screaming yellow hype. Agnetha Fältskog, Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus, and Anni-Frid “Frida” Lyngstad have resolutely declined to perform together, on stage or in the studio, since they last did so in 1982…even for their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2010. (Yeah, I know, but it’s misnamed…think of it as the Baby Boomer Hall of Music and you’ll be OK, altho we’re not sure when…)

What you read about is the release of a remastered CD of their 8th and final album from 1981, The Visitors. It will include the requisite bonus tracks, and one will be “From a Twinkling Star to a Passing Angel.” Nobody knows exactly what this will amount to, altho the resemblance of the title to “Like an Angle Passing Through my Room,” a lackluster ballad on said LP, suggests it’s some sort of demo…or perhaps a medley of early stages of the song…was it originally about a “twinkling star”? We’ll just have to wait until April 23rd to find out.

But here’s how it all played out 30 years ago. After the release of The Visitors in November of 1981, the four assembled in the studio in May and June of 1982 to work on their next LP. They completed 3 tracks… “You Owe Me One”…“I Am the City”…and…”Just Like That”…but producers Benny & Björn weren’t happy with them, and they took a month’s break. In August, they recorded “The Day Before You Came”…“Cassandra”…and…“Under Attack”…but in their minds, the groove was gone, and they settled for a Christmas release of a double-LP The Singles: The First Ten Years. The group called it quits soon after, last performing on British TV in December of 1982.

Of these 6 final songs, 4 were put out as singles that fall…”The Day…” backed with “Cassandra”…and “Under Attack” paired with “You Owe Me One.” Neither charted in the US, and that was pretty much the writing on the wall. ABBA’s last top 10 US hit had been “The Winner Takes It  All” in 1980 at #8…their last Top 40 record was “When All Is Said and Done” in 1981 at #27. “The Visitors” then tanked at #63, their last US chart entry. But all 4 of these new songs were included in the double Singles album.

“I Am the City” would not see the light of day until 1993, on another compilation album, More ABBA Gold. That’s the “18 years”…well, 19 but who can count anymore?…that the news stories are referring to. The irony in my mind is that even at this late stage, and despite B&B’s misgivings, “I Am the City” and “Under Attack” are 2 of ABBA’s finest recordings ever… and “You Owe Me One” is also quite spiffy…and this isn’t just me saying it, but the consensus of the world-wide ABBAficionado community. Click on the titles and hear for yourself. But what happened to that 6th song, “Just Like That”?

It’s also a top fan favorite, available in several versions on bootlegs for decades…the story goes a cassette was stolen from somebody’s car…or something. Why have B&B refused to release it? Because in 1985, they produced an LP for a Swedish brother and sister team known as Gemini…and “Just Like That” was one of the songs they included. Most agree ABBA’s versions are infinitely better, but the boys insist the Gemini version is the definitive one, and it would be “confusing” to release ABBA’s. Huh? After all these years? And despite all the love? Well, that’s their story and they’re sticking to it.

And actually, a chorus of “Just Like That” has been officially released…in the 1994 box set Thank you For the Music…it’s part of a 22-minute medley titled “Undeleted”…in the fashion of the Beatles’ Anthology, this was composed of a whole bunch of demos, early versions, unreleased songs, out-takes, and other loose ends…but nothing in its entirety, only brief snippets.

Thus, when the news of this “new” song first hit, it was assumed the Holy Grail of ABBAdom was about to surface…but no such luck. On the bright side, the other 5 “last songs” are included on this new The Visitors CD…all in once place, for the convenience of latecomers. Anyway, you can check out 2 ABBA versions of “Just Like That”…the “na na na ” version…and the “sax” version…and if it sounds vaguely familiar, the melody of verse, altho not the chorus, was re-used in the musical Chess…which of course was a major post-ABBA project of Benny and Björn’s.

And what the heck, here’s this edition of DFHC‘s own “bonus track”…one of my favorite ABBA songs is “Does Your Mother Know?”…and here’s where the the break comes from…the unreleased “Dream World.”

Wicked Ballsy…

For the record, “Agnetha” is not pronounced AG-netha, like Agnes……but instead anh-YET-ah. And I’m sure you have no trouble remember which is which, but I always did…so several years ago I formalized this mnemonic device:  Everybody knows blondes come from Sweden. So the one who isn’t blonde can’t be Swedish…she must be Finnish!…and that’s F for Frida…done and done…

üppkaftig urtag…

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More bloggage at  http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com  and  http://www.examiner.com/retro-pop-culture-in-watertown/mark-john-astolfi

Resume at http://travelingcyst.blogspot.com/p/resume.html

Audio samples at  http://stolfspots.podbean.com