Over many years of reading, I began to notice things of historical importance (at least to me) occurring on the same day: November 22. This led to jotting down my periodic discoveries on a notepad, and in no time a list began taking shape. Then the idea presented itself of transforming my growing roster of ‘happenings’ into a short volume—the way others have written books of consequential years. This TRivia posting reflects that aspiration and offers two samples of what I’ve been collecting.

Is smuggling morally wrong in all instances? While by definition transgressive and often a crime, must it always bear the dark stigma of having deliberately introduced something risky or harmful into an unknowing, vulnerable environment? The cult action-comedy film Snakes on a Plane (2006) would certainly suggest as much. So might Arlo Guthrie’s Woodstock-era song, “Coming into Los Angeles” (‘bringing in a couple of keys’). How about Odysseus’ Trojan Horse? Well-intentioned moviegoers could disagree about the 1931 film Monkey Business, in which all four of the Marx brothers play stowaways on an ocean liner, hidden on board in kippered herring barrels. Everybody knows the kind of mischief they can cause.

I can hardly wait for the June 12 release of Steven Spielberg’s new film, Disclosure Day. I know I’m not alone. With all the buzz attending NASA’s recent Artemis moon mission, the Trump administration’s pledge to disclose all UFO files, the recent (May 8) dump of 162 declassified UFO files by the Pentagon, and unending social media chatter about UFOs, I find myself rocketing back to the days of my youth. Kudos to Florida congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna for her unwavering stand for full disclosure of all Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP). She won’t be quiet until she gets the government’s 46 UAP videos.

“When the Professor is told by the Polynesian that once there was nothing except a great feathered serpent, unless the man feels a thrill and a half temptation to wish it were true, he is no judge of such things at all.” (G. K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man)

On March 23, 1888, Chief Justice Morrison Waite died. He was seventy-one. For fourteen years he had occupied the center seat on the highest court in the land.

After considering a short list of possible replacements, President Grover Cleveland opted for Chicago-based attorney, Melville Weston Fuller. He’d wanted a prominent Midwesterner, and with 30 years of legal practice in Illinois, Fuller seemed to fit the bill. Cleveland announced the nomination of the fifty-five-year-old on May 2, 1888.

I’m going to go out on a limb and assert that most Americans know more about the eagle nest site in California’s Big Bear Valley than they do about members of the US Supreme Court. I’d further bet that they could identify by name the eagles and ‘bonking’ eaglets (past and present) who’ve known this nest as home. Is it because they are so doggone cute or is it the cameras? Perhaps both? Is this, perhaps, the strongest possible argument for having cameras in the courtroom.

So far, we have established the fact that Mr. Jefferson was quite the eccentric backwoods Renaissance man whose intellectual appetite knew few limits. It is also clear from what we’ve shown that he was no stranger or Stoic to devastating emotional blows of sadness and grief. The pungent smells emanating from his Monticello outhouse roused him to build and install a stone-lined shaft to ventilate its offensive odors. Life can sometimes be like a latrine; both can occasionally stink to high heaven. Getting away from grief is as individual as the singularity of grief itself.

I claim no expertise as a Dylanologist. I’m just a fan, a big one. If I were ever marooned on an island and had only five record albums to listen to for the remainder of my days, three of them would be Dylan.

In my previous post, I tried to convey the humanity behind the historical figure of our third president. I highlighted Jefferson’s proclivities as a polymath—what areas of information concerning the world and all its contents didn’t attract his active interest? An ornithologist, an architect (Monticello and the University of Virginia), an inventor (a wheel cipher, a spherical sundial, a hideaway bed, a two-faced mirror…

It is Sunday evening, April 29, 1962. President John F. Kennedy is hosting a dinner in the State Dining Room of the White House honoring 49 Nobel Prize winners. You might recognize the names of a few of his distinguished guests—J. Robert Oppenheimer, Linus Pauling, John Glenn, Robert Frost, James Baldwin, Melvin Calvin and Pearl S. Buck.

Looking once again at my weathered (and by me defaced) copy of The Beatles (aka “White Album”) resurrects in my mind all the tales told within the fertile land of Beatlemania about which Beatle scored which copy of the legendary record.

Who poured the “Orange Crush” into the punch? Denver Bronco defensive end Lyle Alzado wanted to display his prowess on a stage other than the football field.