Your HOLIDAY SOR-BAY: John Lennon - Happy Christmas War Is Over

 

Here is a

"HOLIDAY SOR-BAY"

a little spark of madness

that we could use to artificially maintain our Christmas spirit.

December 8, 1980

John Lennon, is murdered by a deranged fan in front of his New York apartment building. Lennon was born in 1940 in Liverpool, England. As a boy, Lennon lived with his aunt after his father left the family. Lennon attended Quarry Bank High School, from which he derived the name for his first band, the Quarrymen, formed in 1955. In 1956, he met Paul McCartney, who joined the band, and the two began writing songs together. George Harrison joined the band in 1957, and the three played together under several different names and with varying members until 1960, when they adopted the name the Beatles.

The band toured German beerhouses in 1961 and debuted later that year at the Cavern Club in Liverpool, where they gave more than 300 performances during the next two years. Drummer Ringo Starr joined the group in 1962. The group scored several U.K. hits in 1963, launching the "Beatlemania" tidal wave that hit the United States in 1964. In a little more than 10 years, the group transformed rock and roll, scoring 20 No. 1 hits on the Billboard pop charts, more than any group in history. The group's records spent a total of 59 weeks topping the charts between 1964 and 1970.

Lennon divorced his first wife, Cynthia Lennon, the mother of his son Julian, and married artist Yoko Ono in 1969. With Ono, he released the album Two Virgins in 1968. He became more involved in liberal political causes and pursued projects with Ono. In 1970, McCartney announced that the Beatles had broken up. Lennon released his first solo album, Imagine, in 1971, and it rose to No. 1 on the charts. During the next few years, he released projects with Ono as well as his own solo albums, including chart-topper Walls and Bridges (1974). He gave his last public performance in 1974 and released his last solo album, Rock 'n' Roll, the following year. In 1975, Lennon and Ono had a son, Sean, and in 1980 the couple released their album Double Fantasy, which topped the charts and included the No. 1 single "(Just Like) Starting Over."

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Tony Figueroa

Your HOLIDAY SOR-BAY: Simpsons 2010 Christmas Special

 

Here is a

"HOLIDAY SOR-BAY"

a little spark of madness

that we could use to artificially maintain our Christmas spirit.

 

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Tony Figueroa

Your HOLIDAY SOR-BAY: Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer Sing Along with Lyrics

Here is a "HOLIDAY SOR-BAY"

a little spark of madness

that we could use to artificially maintain our Christmas spirit.

TV History

December 6, 1964

Rudolph the Red–Nosed Reindeer the long-running Christmas television special produced in stop motion animation by Rankin/Bass first aired on the NBC television network. 

The show was sponsored by General Electric under the umbrella title of The General Electric Fantasy Hour.

The special is based on the song by Johnny Marks, which was in turn taken from the 1939 poem of the same title written by Marks' brother-in-law, Robert L. May. Since 1972, the special has aired over CBS, which unveiled a high-definition, digitally remastered version in 2005. As with A Charlie Brown Christmas and How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Rudolph no longer airs just once annually, but several times during the Christmas season. It has been telecast every year since 1964, making it the longest running Christmas TV special, and one of only four 1960s Christmas specials still being telecast (the others being A Charlie Brown Christmas, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and Frosty the Snowman). And again, as with the Charlie Brown special, Rudolph has now been shown more than thirty-one times on CBS, although in this case, CBS was not Rudolph 's original network.

On December 6, 2024 Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer returned to NBC

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Tony Figueroa

Your HOLIDAY SOR-BAY: Christmas Flintstone Song

 

Here is a "HOLIDAY SOR-BAY"

a little spark of madness

that we could use to artificially maintain our Christmas spirit.

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Tony Figueroa

Your HOLIDAY SOR-BAY: Home for the Holidays - SNL

 

Here is a

"HOLIDAY SOR-BAY"

a little spark of madness

that we could use to artificially maintain our Christmas spirit.

December 4, 1934

Winston Conrad "Wink" Martindale is born.

Disc jockey and television game show host.

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Tony Figueroa

Your HOLIDAY SOR-BAY: Christmas Eve on Sesame Street

 

Here is a 

"HOLIDAY SOR-BAY"

a little spark of madness

that we could use to artificially maintain our Christmas spirit.

Christmas Eve on Sesame Street is a Sesame Street Christmas special first broadcast on PBS on Sunday, December 3, 1978.

TV History

December 3, 1979

Eleven people killed in a stampede outside Who concert in Cincinnati, Ohio. 

The general-admission ticketing policy for rock concerts at Cincinnati's Riverfront Coliseum in the 1970s was known as "festival seating." That term and that ticketing policy would become infamous in the wake of one of the deadliest rock-concert incidents in history. Eleven people, including three high-school students, were killed on this day in 1979, when a crowd of general-admission ticket-holders to a Cincinnati Who concert surged forward in an attempt to enter Riverfront Coliseum and secure prime unreserved seats inside.

Festival seating had already been eliminated at many similar venues in the United States by 1979, yet the system remained in place at Riverfront Coliseum despite a dangerous incident at a Led Zeppelin show two years earlier. That day, 60 would-be concertgoers were arrested, and dozens more injured, when the crowd outside the venue surged up against the Coliseum's locked glass doors.

In the early evening hours of December 3, 1979, those same doors stood locked before a restless and growing crowd of Who fans. That evening's concert was scheduled to begin at 8:00 pm, but ticket-holders had begun to gather outside the Coliseum shortly after noon, and by 3:00 pm, police had been called in to maintain order as the crowd swelled into the thousands. By 7:00 pm, an estimated 8,000 ticket-holders were jostling for position in a plaza at the Coliseum's west gate, and the crowd began to press forward. When a police lieutenant on the scene tried to convince the show's promoters to open the locked glass doors at the west gate entrance, he was told that there were not enough ticket-takers on duty inside, and that union rules prevented them from recruiting ushers to perform that duty. At approximately 7:20, the crowd surged forward powerfully as one set of glass doors shattered and the others were thrown open.

With Coliseum security nowhere in sight, the police on hand were aware almost immediately that the situation had the potential for disaster, yet they were physically unable to slow the stream of people flowing through the plaza for at least the next 15 minutes. At approximately 7:45 pm, they began to work their way into the crowd, where they found the first of what would eventually turn out to be 11 concert-goers lying on the ground, dead from asphyxiation.

Afraid of how the crowd might react to a cancellation, Cincinnati fire officials instructed the promoters to go on with the show, and the members of the Who were not told what had happened until after completing their final encore hours later.

In the aftermath of the tragedy, the City of Cincinnati banned festival seating at its concert venues. That ban was overturned, however, 24 years later, and improved crowd-control procedures have thus far prevented a reoccurrence of any such incident.

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Tony Figueroa

Your HOLIDAY SOR-BAY: Bing Crosby & David Bowie

 

Here is a "HOLIDAY SOR-BAY"

a little spark of madness

that we could use to artificially maintain our Christmas spirit.

The Little Drummer Boy / Peace On Earth.
Music video by Bing Crosby & David Bowie performing

TV History

December 2, 1914

Ray Walston is born Herman Raymond Walston. Best known as the title character on the 1960s CBS situation comedy My Favorite Martian. He is also remembered for such iconic stage, film and television roles as Luther Billis (South Pacific); Mr. Applegate (Damn Yankees); J.J. Singleton (The Sting), Mr. Hand (Fast Times at Ridgemont High) and Judge Henry Bone (Picket Fences).

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Tony Figueroa

Wayne Northrop

Wayne Alan Northrop

April 12, 1947 – November 29, 2024

Wayne Northrop portrayed chauffeur Michael Culhane on Dynasty from the pilot episode, "Oil" (1981), until the season one finale, "The Testimony" (1981). He returned in the seventh season premiere "The Victory" (1986), and left again in the 1987 episode "The Sublet".

Northrop is best known as Roman Brady on Days of Our Lives, a character he played from 1981–1984, and again from 1991–1994. He next portrayed Rex Stanton on Port Charles from 1997 to 1998. In August 2005, Northrop returned to Days as a new character named Dr. Alex North.

Wayne Northrop with Drake Hogestyn 

Stay Tuned Tony Figueroa

Your HOLIDAY SOR-BAY: MST3K #521 - Santa Claus

 

Here is a

"HOLIDAY SOR-BAY"

a little spark of madness

that we could use to artificially maintain our Christmas spirit.

Mystery Science Theater 3000 - Santa Claus It's Christmas time on the SOL! After Mike and the 'bots exchange gifts, they get to watch a movie where Santa Claus has to outwit Satan in order to deliver gifts.

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Tony Figueroa