Vicissitudes of the Damned: Birthday

Showing posts with label Birthday. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Issue No. 218: (Tranny) Napoleon Bonaparte Turns 243 Today!

Napoleon on his Imperial throne wearing his laurel leaf crown.
Painting by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres in 1806.

b. Ajaccio, Corsica, 1769. Believe what you will, but stories to the effect that the emperor of France was not the man he was cracked up to be have circulated for more than a century and a half. The basis for these stories seems to have been the post-mortem report of one Dr. Henry, revealing the "progressive feminization" that Napoleon's body had undergone through the years: "The whole surface of the body was deeply covered with fat. Over the sternum, where generally the bone is very superficial, the fat was upwards of an inch deep and an inch and a half or two inches on the abdomen. There was scarcely any hair on the body, and that of the head was thin, fine and silky. The whole genital system (very small) seemed to exhibit a physical cause for the absence of sexual desire, and the chastity which had been stated to have characterized the deceased [Napoleon had been kept prisoner on St. Helena for seven years]. The skin was noticed to be very white and delicate, as were the hands and arms. Indeed the whole body was slender and effeminate. The pubis much resembled the mons vernis in women. The muscles of the chest were small, the shoulders narrow, and the hips wide." So much for 19th-century science.

From The Gay Book of Days by Martin Grief. 1982.

Sunday, June 10, 2012

Issue No. 195: Dead Queen Paul Lynde Would Have Been 86 Wednesday.

Paul Lynde, b. Mt Vernon, Ohio, 1926. How does one pigeon-hole the show-biz persona of Paul Lynde? Perhaps it's not incorrect to say that he was Franklin Pangborn fifty years later, given the license to say that Hollywood Code prevented Panghorn from ever saying, even though you knew, just looking at his face, that he was capable of saying it. Or perhaps Lynde was Franklin Pangborn crossed with Eve Arden, women always having been given the opportunity fro comic bitchery denied men becasue in women such behavior was seen to be "in character". Whatever he was, Lynde was pretty funny at it. And he was known, on more than one occassion, to have shocked the hair-roller set with his acid queen-like tongue. "Why do motorcyclists wear leather?" he was asked on Hollywood Squares. "Because chiffon wrinkles too easily, that's why." That was Paul Lynde in our time. Franklin Pangborn wouldn't have been permitted to know what a motorcyclist was no less to have been known anything about leather. But he might have been seen ironing the chiffon. That's the difference that time makes.

Paul Lynde, Gemini

Franklin Pangborn, b. [January 23] Newark, New Jersey, 1893. This unforgettable character actor built his entire thirty-year film career on playing prissy, fluttery clerks, bank tellers, assistant hotel managers and department store floorwalkers. Was he in fact the gay Stepin Fetchit? Who cares. He was funny, had perfect comic timing, and brightened many an otherwise dreary picture by his amusing presence. And if Pangborn's public thought that sissies and sister-marys were one and the same, so what? They sure as hell don't think so now. Rest in peace, dear Franklin Pangborn.

Franklin Pangborn, Aquarius

From The Gay Book of Days by Martin Grief (with Foreword by Samuel Steward). The Main Street Press. 1982.

Friday, August 19, 2011

Issue No. 105: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, V.D.!

- Daniel W. Teafoe

It's exactly one year ago that I launched Vicissitudes of the Damned 1. I am pleased to announce that our global readership has grown to about 8000. Thank you for your interest and support.

Warm Regards,

Erik Peterson

Sunday, August 7, 2011

Issue No. 99: Andy Warhol Would Have Turned 83 Yesterday.

You glean new information everyday.

Warhol instructed Billy Name [ne Linich], to write back asking if Campbell's would be interested in purchasing any of the soup can pieces. This was the letter sent in reply:

From warholstars.org:

JULY 9 - AUGUST 4, 1962: ANDY WARHOL HAS HIS FIRST SOLO POP EXHIBITION.

The exhibition at Irving Blum's Ferus Gallery on La Cienega Blvd. in West Hollywood featured Warhol's series of 32 different canvases of Campbell's soup cans. A nearby supermarket piled up real Campbell's soup cans in their window, advertising them as "the real thing for only 29 cents a can."

Six of the Warhol paintings were sold for $100 each. The buyers included Don Factor, Betty Astor, Ed Jans and Bob Brown. Blum ended up getting the buyers to relinquish their ownership so that he could get keep the set together, and bought the entire series for $1,000.00 from Warhol, paying him $100.00 a month. (PS219) A year after Warhol died, Irving Blum was offered $10 million for the paintings. They are currently on permanent loan to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. (BC27)

Interesting.....