[Somewhere in San Francisco. Danger Zone (dir. William Berke, 1951). Click for a larger view.]
Hugh Beaumont exits a Yellow Cab. TUxedo was indeed a San Francisco exchange, as telephone number-cards attest. TUxedo 5-1234 was indeed the number of the Yellow Cab Company. And before that, TUxedo 1234. Here’s an advertising thermometer with the shorter number. And here’s someone who recalls the added 5.
More EXchange names on screen
Act of Violence : The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse : Armored Car Robbery : Baby Face : Blast of Silence : The Blue Dahlia : Boardwalk Empire : Born Yesterday : The Brasher Doubloon : Chinatown : The Dark Corner : Dark Passage : Deception : Deux hommes dans Manhattan : Dick Tracy’s Deception : Down Three Dark Streets : Dream House : East Side, West Side : The Little Giant : The Man Who Cheated Himself : Modern Marvels : Murder by Contract : Murder, My Sweet : My Week with Marilyn : Naked City (1) : Naked City (2) : Naked City (3) : Naked City (4) : Naked City (5) : Naked City (6) : Naked City (7) : Nightfall : Nightmare Alley : Out of the Past : Perry Mason : The Public Enemy : Railroaded! : Side Street : Stage Fright : Sweet Smell of Success : Tension : This Gun for Hire : Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?
Friday, January 24, 2020
EXchange name sighting
By Michael Leddy at 7:55 AM comments: 4
Overheard
“I have an old-fashioned stereo system. You know how you used to buy components?”
Related reading
All OCA “overheard” posts (Pinboard)
Illustration from a pamphlet accompanying a component system (c. 1983)
By Michael Leddy at 7:54 AM comments: 0
Thursday, January 23, 2020
The House Managers
The House Managers: it’s a great team, each member bringing an individual history and individual strengths to the moment. But I think they must have all agreed on a crucial point: “Give the ball to Adam.”
[January 23, 2020.]
“If right doesn’t matter, we’re lost. If the truth doesn’t matter, we’re lost.”
[The words that might be chopped off by the ad: “The American people deserve a president.”]
By Michael Leddy at 9:46 PM comments: 2
Jim Lehrer (1934–2020)
Jim Lehrer believed that news is “not a commodity.” From the New York Times obituary:
“News is information that’s required in a democratic society, and Thomas Jefferson said a democracy is dependent on an informed citizenry. That sounds corny, but I don’t care whether it sounds corny or not. It’s the truth.”Lehrer died today at the age of eighty-five.
Related posts
Jim Lehrer’s journalistic guidelines
Jim Lehrer’s Post-it Notes
By Michael Leddy at 9:00 PM comments: 2
A Mongol sighting
[Tamu Blackwell, James Earl Jones, Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs. Claudine (dir. John Berry, 1974). Click either image for a larger view.]
Elaine spotted it first: Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs is holding a Mongol pencil. The ferrule gives it away.
Related reading
All OCA Mongol posts (Pinboard)
By Michael Leddy at 8:30 AM comments: 2
Subtitle, about language
The World in Words podcast hasn’t had a new episode in ten months. But I opened my iTunes the other day to discover that a new podcast has taken its place: Subtitle. This podcast, too, is all about language. Hosted by Patrick Cox (from TWiW) and Kavita Pillay, Subtitle is smart, well-edited, and worth any listener’s time.
[Can iTunes just switch you over from one podcast to another? I do not recall adding Subtitle, or even knowing about it before it showed up in my subscriptions.]
By Michael Leddy at 8:30 AM comments: 0
Wednesday, January 22, 2020
Steve Martin Caro (1948–2020)
Steve Martin Caro, lead singer with The Left Banke, has died at the age of seventy-one. Rolling Stone has a brief obituary.
The Left Banke’s extraordinary musical potential yielded just three LPs and a handful of non-album 45s. Here is the group’s “other” hit: “Pretty Ballerina.” The one everyone knows: “Walk Away Renée.”
Related posts
George Cameron (1947–2018)
What I hear in “Walk Away Renée”
By Michael Leddy at 8:46 PM comments: 0
Not milkness but phoneless
Senators: not milkless, but phoneless.
Thanks, Ben.
[Post title with apologies to Stevie Smith.]
By Michael Leddy at 2:38 PM comments: 0
Being 97
Herbert Fingarette, philosopher: “Much as I think our life in this world is often a pretty messy affair, I still would like to hang around.”
Being 97 is a short film by Andrew Hasse, Herbert Fingarette’s grandson.
By Michael Leddy at 9:40 AM comments: 0
Vocative comma, no comma
“Hey, Good Lookin’” | “Hey Joe” |
Hello, Dolly! | “Hello Stranger” |
Good Morning, Vietnam | “Good Morning Starshine” |
“Goodnight, Irene” | Goodnight Moon |
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road | Goodbye, Columbus |
A related post
Stan Carey on the vocative comma
[Not only does the title Goodnight Moon have no comma. The text of the book has no commas.]
By Michael Leddy at 8:49 AM comments: 0