80th Anniversary of "Shazam!" - The controversy, the lawsuit, TV and New Movie!

1st Appearance, Feb 1940, Whiz Comics #2

As a superhero fan, there's a lot of news and drama about a character we'll all see in movie theaters this April, 2019. His name is Shazam, and 2019 marks the 80th Anniversary of his creation in 1939. He first appeared in Whiz Comics #2 in February 1940. In today's blog, you'll learn how he became more popular than Superman for a time and how lawsuits ended his publication and stripped him of his "Captain Marvel" name (He used to be called "Captain Marvel," and would say the word "Shazam" to make the transformation into the hero, but a rival comics group got NASTY).
Here's the story:

WHO IS THE CHARACTER? - in 2019, now called Shazam, and created as and formerly known as Captain Marvel, he is a fictional comic book superhero. He is the alter ego of Billy Batson, a boy who, by speaking the magic word "SHAZAM" (acronym of six "immortal elders": Solomon, Hercules, Atlas, Zeus, Achilles and Mercury), can transform himself into a costumed adult with the powers of superhuman strength, speed, flight and other abilities.

WHO CREATED HIM?? Artist C. C. Beck and writer Bill Parker created the character in 1939.
FIRST APPEARANCE - In Whiz Comics #2 (cover-dated Feb. 1940), published by Fawcett Comics.
OUTSOLD SUPERMAN AT ONE TIME - Based on book sales, the character was the most popular superhero of the 1940s, outselling even Superman.

LAWSUIT #1 STOPPED PUBLICATION - Fawcett ceased publishing Captain Marvel-related comics in 1953, partly because of a copyright infringement suit from DC Comics, alleging that Captain Marvel was a copy of Superman. In 1972, DC licensed the Marvel Family characters from Fawcett, and returned them to publication. By 1991, DC had acquired all rights to the characters. DC has since integrated Captain Marvel and the Marvel Family into their DC Universe and has attempted to revive the property several times, with mixed success.

DC comics Revives Shazam in 1973

LAWSUIT #2 BY RIVAL COMICS COMPANY - Due to trademark conflicts over another character named "Captain Marvel" owned by Marvel Comics, DC has branded and marketed the character using the trademark Shazam! since his 1972 reintroduction.

AS A COMICS' FAN, I FEEL MARVEL COMICS WAS JUST NASTY - In my opinion, as a long time comics reader, Marvel Comics was just being idiotic. They KNEW that when the Shazam character was created in 1939, he was known as Captain Marvel. Yet, they stole the name and created their own "Captain Marvel," and then trademarked it before DC Comics could. Now, Marvel's *what I think of as a dumb and boring character* has her own movie coming out (the trailers even look awful).

TELEVISION AND MOVIES
1) In 1941, Captain Marvel (Now Shazam) was adapted into film, in a 1941 Republic Pictures serial titled Adventures of Captain Marvel,with Tom Tyler as Captain Marvel and Frank Coghlan, Jr. as Billy Batson

1974 TV Shazam, Jackson Bostwick

2) The most popular Television show was aired in 1974. Filmation produced Shazam!, a live-action television show, which ran from 1974 to 1977 on CBS.[198] From 1975 until the end of its run, it aired as one-half of The Shazam!/Isis Hour, featuring Filmation's own The Secrets of Isis as a companion program. Shazam! starred Michael Gray as Billy Batson, with both Jackson Bostwick (season 1) and John Davey (seasons 2 and 3) as Captain Marvel.
3) - There were several other Shazam appearances in live action films (mostly in the 40s and 50s), television and animated features. You can read about them om Wikipedia's detailed page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Marvel_(DC_Comics)
4) APRIL 5, 2019's FILM - and then there's a new film being released in April 2019 about Shazam! The trailer is below.
 MOVIE TRAILER: https://youtu.be/gdYQ32q5vkc

Frustrations from a Senior Dog

It's Dolly day, Wednesday. 
Our 14 year old Weimaraner Dolly is frustrated with getting old. In the last couple of weeks she has been walking more slowly, having some indoor accidents and acting somewhat disoriented when going outside. She still climbs and descends stairs well, has a great appetite, and is amazing at agility. She's just frustrated about her bathroom habits. She says "please be patient with old pups. We don't like it either when our bodies don't listen to our heads."

Archaeology: Creswell Crags, UK : 'Witches' marks' found in cave network

Here's an interesting find from the United Kingdom- a cave filled with "Witches Marks." They were found in Nottinghamshire, in central England, about 150 miles north of London. Here's the story:



Creswell Crags: 'Witches' marks' found in cave network 
BBC News Feb 17, 2019 
Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-47242603

  Hundreds of "witches' marks" believed to be from the 17th and 18th Centuries have been found in a limestone gorge. They were discovered at Creswell Crags, Nottinghamshire, and are believed to be the biggest concentration of protective marks found in British caves.
The "apotropaic" marks were scribed into the cave surface as they were thought to keep evil spirits coming from the underworld.
Originally thought to be graffiti, they have now been reclassified.

 Image copyright Creswell Crags:  Image caption The marks have always been noticed, but for years were dismissed as graffiti from before the caves were barred

The discovery was made by Hayley Clark and Ed Waters from Subterranea Britannica, a charity whose members have a passion for underground space, during a cave tour.
Before then the marks had always been noticed, but dismissed as graffiti from before the caves were barred.

Alison Fearn, of Leicester University, who studied her PHD on protective marks, said: "I cannot emphasise how important this corpus of apotropaia is to graffiti research.
"I think off the top of my head, it is the largest number of examples found anywhere and in any context in the UK."

Protection marks are most commonly found in medieval churches and houses, near the entrance points, particularly doorways, windows and fireplaces. 

Image copyright Creswell Crags

Image caption Members of the Subterranea Britannica group made the discovery

Creswell Crags said it was thought that the largest quantity of "witches' marks" in British caves were the 57 found in a Somerset cave, but there are hundreds in one cave alone at Creswell.
They include the double V, which is believed to mean Virgin of Virgins, while PM is thought to reference Pace Maria.

Diagonal lines, boxes and mazes are thought to be symbols for capturing or trapping evil.
John Charlesworth, tour leader at the time of the discovery, said: "These witches' marks were in plain sight all the time.

"Being present at the moment their true significance was revealed will stay with me forever."

A Fun Dog Opera Video

Yes, there's now a thing called "Dog Opera!" - it's called New Tale For Handel and Tilda Swinton Directed this Dog Opera. Here's the 5 minute video...

Actress Tilda Swinton has extended her creativity chops with an unusual opera arrangement featuring her dogs. Filmed on the coast of Scotland, the music video is surprisingly effective, though it does offer an unavoidable hint of goofiness.

Don’t worry, the dogs don’t sing. Swinton’s springer spaniels run through the sand, gambol in the water, wrestle, leap and jockey for position as someone off-camera apparently prepares to throw a ball. With the aid of photographic tricks, the dogs appear to move in some kind of harmony, and sometimes symmetry.

The music is George Frideric Handel’s “Rompo i Lacci” from “Flavio” (1723), sung by countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo.

According to Entertainment Weekly, Swinton co-directed the video with Sandro Kopp for multimedia company Visionaire’s Glass Handel projec


VIDEO: https://youtu.be/XcTS15OO0Bw

Our Thought of the Day: What to Do WIth a Person's or Pet's Ashes?

One of the things we've talked about is what to do with our ashes after we're gone. Of course, we plan to have them mixed with the ashes of our dogs and spread out somewhere. On January 31, 2019, an article in BBC News highlighted how Washington State is moving to legalize using ashes for compost. It makes sense, really. The Earth is running out of cemeteries and why not contribute your remains to help grow plant life?
    Think about how many tombstones sit in older cemeteries that no one knows. Granted, that some religions mandate burial, but if you can look past religion (we're all going to be energy as a spirit -or an earth-bound ghost if you prefer - although you shouldn't), you can do something after your time to help promote other living things!
   There's a company in the U.S. already that inserts ashes in a "bio urn." The company, called "Living Urn" said a tree urn is a biodegradable urn or bio urn that grows a tree in combination with ashes or cremated remains. The Living Urn tree urn and the urn itself is made from 100% biodegradable materials that are all natural and it will grow a living memorial tree. The Living Urn offers a special Bio Urn for People and a different Bio Urn for pets. You can learn more about them here: https://www.thelivingurn.com/ 

Meanwhile here's the BBC article...

How do you compost a human body - and why would you?
BBC NEWS 1-31-19

This is the vision - in an indoor garden, a honeycomb structure lines the walls, and inside each cell, a human body composts. When it's done, loved ones take home a pot of soil, not an urn of ash.

A person's final resting place could be the foundations of a flowerbed or could feed the roots of a tree.

This is what Washington state is preparing to legalise. If the bill passes, the western state would be the first in the nation to allow human composting as a burial option.

Here's what it means to choose a compost burial - and why a growing group of Americans are eschewing convention for a new way to rest in peace.

The driving force behind the movement in Washington state is Katrina Spade and her company, Recompose.

It says it can turn you into useable, fertile, soil in 30 days.

"It's just an accelerated process of natural decomposition," says Nora Menkin, executive director of People's Memorial, a non-profit funerary services advocacy group in Seattle, Washington.

The method Recompose offers is based on the ways we already compost livestock - with a few changes from Washington State University soil science researcher Prof Lynne Carpenter-Boggs to make the mixture more socially acceptable.

Based on research from Prof Carpenter-Boggs' team, the final process involves placing the body in a mix of wood chips and similar composting materials, allowing thermophilic - heat-loving - microbes and bacteria to get to work.

Remains are also heated to 131 F (55 C), killing off contagions so the resulting soil is safe to use - a key part of why many supporters prefer this manner of burial.

"We have all this energy and potential that's either burned up or sealed away in burials, when it could be utilised to let life go on," Ms Menkin says.

Here's the Full Article (that goes into how a corpse would decompose if buried, and it's icky): https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47031816

Idiots of the Week: A Human Border Wall

A "wall of idiots"

It's sad how racism is so rampant among the uneducated, that they make a stand to show it. What's more is that these people also claim to be christian (and they certainly don't follow Jesus' teachings of helping the poor, needy, and oppressed).  Here's an example of those idiots of the week and what they did in Texas during the week of Feb. 10: 

Trump Supporters Form Human ‘Wall’ Along U.S.-Mexico Border

Supporters of President Donald Trump’s proposed border security measures gathered to form a human “wall” along a section of the U.S.-Mexico border in New Mexico on Saturday, Feb 9.

Donning “Make America great again” hats, chanting “build a wall” and waving American flags, the demonstrators linked arms near an open section of the border at Sunland Park, northwest of El Paso.

One of the protesters, said “We are here to bring attention to the fact that there isn’t a wall here.” .

The demonstration comes ahead of the president’s visit Monday to El Paso, a Texas city he has falsely claimed was one of the nation’s most dangerous prior to the construction of a border barrier in last week’s State of the Union address.

In reality, El Paso has been listed as one of the safest cities in America for the past 20 years, and construction of the border barrier didn’t start until 2008.

Story: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/

BORDER LIES Video:- Randy Rainbow Song Parody

If you liked Madonna's "Borderline" and you like Randy Rainbow, you'll love his latest
parody "Border Lies" - He's brilliant!

Video: https://youtu.be/EInIEuNSMrI

Cool Discovery: New 'mysterious' frog species discovered in India's Western Ghats

It's so exciting to discover a new species, and recently a 'mysterious' frog species was discovered in India's Western Ghats!
Here's the story:

New 'mysterious' frog species discovered in India's Western Ghats

Source: BBC News: 2-13-19

Sonali Garg, a PhD student at Delhi University, and her supervisor SD Biju found the new species in the Western Ghats, a biodiversity hotspot in southern India.

The species belongs to a new Indian frog group or genus which the scientists have named Mysticellus.

The name is derived from Latin and means mysterious and diminutive.

The scientists discovered the narrow-mouthed frog after three years of extensive explorations, and have confirmed that it represents an entirely new species and genus of microhylid frogs.

The new genus is currently known only in a single locality.

"Our discovery of this new frog genus from one of the most explored and researched regions in the Western Ghats indicates that documentation of amphibians in this globally recognised biodiversity hotspot is still far from being complete," says Sonali Garg.

"This frog went unnoticed until now probably because it appears for less than four days for breeding activities and lives a secretive lifestyle for the rest of the year."

A number of new frog species have been discovered in the Western Ghats in the past decade, making it one of the leading biodiversity hotspots in the world.

A new tadpole that burrows through sand was discovered in Western Ghats in 2016, and an extraordinary tree frog thought to have died out more than a century ago was also rediscovered in the same year.

In 2017, four new species of burrowing frogs were discovered in the region.

A Great Read: Craig and Fred (A Marine, Stray Dog and How they rescued each other)

As a dog dad and dog rescuer, I love to read stories about people rescuing dogs, and I just enjoyed a
book about a Marine in Afghanistan who met a special dog he named "Fred" and bonded with. The book, "Craig and Fred" is a true story written by Craig Grossi, the marine who Fred found in a war zone. Craig explains how this scrappy dog bonded with him during the Taliban war in Afghanistan, and how Craig when through hoops to get Fred to the U.S. to wait for him. 
   The chapters take you through Craig's war-time experiences and some are heart-wrenching. Alternative chapters take place after Craig returned home and reunited with Fred, then took a cross- country journey. 
  It's a wonderful book and there are great photos in the back of the book. Craig learned what dog parents learn- there's nothing like the unconditional love of a dog. Get the book and enjoy it! - Rob

In the News: Brexit Uncertainty Triggers Rash of No. Ireland Passports

Earlier this week, BBC News reported that post offices in Northern Ireland had run out of passport

forms. It's like people from the U.S. trying to move to Canada.... Here's the story about how the Brexit is affecting Northern Ireland's passport requests:

BBC News said "Uncertainly over Brexit is driving demand for Irish passports in Northern Ireland, with some post offices running out of forms, officials say. Post Offices across Northern Ireland were called by the Irish Passport Service on Tuesday to be told more forms would be delivered. One Post Office manager described the current demand as "crazy" adding that it was driven by fears over Brexit."

Each application for a standard 10-year passport costs €80 (£71).

Belfast's central Post Office ran out of the forms on Friday. Branch manager Irene Edgar said the demand was huge. "High demand, especially in the last few weeks, means there is a stock and delivery issue," she said.

The Post Office in the border town of Strabane in County Tyrone has no forms, despite ordering them three weeks ago. Branch manager Christine McNulty said the demand was "completely crazy".

"People are afraid, that's why they want their Irish passports, fear around Brexit," she said, when asked why the demand was so high.

Part 4: National Portrait Gallery: , Eleanor Roosevelt, Bill Clinton, FDR, Abraham Lincoln and George Washington

Eleanor Roosevelt

In this final blog about some of the paintings that we saw at the Smithsonian's National
Portrait Gallery, we'll show you portraits of  Bill Clinton, FDR, Eleanor Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. 

In this blog, we thought we'd share the Smithsonian's write up about Eleanor Roosevelt. I especially love the quote from her "You must do the thing you think you cannot do." 

ABOUT ELEANOR'S PORTRAIT - The National Portrait Gallery is delighted to display Bernard Frydrysiak’s portrait of Eleanor Roosevelt as a loan honoring the museum’s fiftieth anniversary. Fortuitously 2018 is also the seventieth anniversary of one of Roosevelt’s greatest achievements: the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. It reminds us of the compassion and courage that enabled one remarkable woman to make an enormous difference in the world and recalls one of the “Keys to a More Fulfilling Life” that she shared in her book You Learn by Living, published in 1960:

Abraham Lincoln

You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, “I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.”
 In short, she concluded, “You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”

FUN FACT- In the gallery hangs what looks like an unfinished portrait of President George Washington that was used for the one dollar bill! 

Bill Clinton

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

George Washington

 

Part 3: National Portrait Gallery: JFK and John Adams

Jeff at the JFK portrait

This is part 3 of our visit to the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery to see some amazing paintings on display there. Jeff accompanied us and we all enjoyed seeing the presidential portraits. In this blog you'll see 2 presidents that hailed from my (Rob) home state of Massachusetts: JFK and John Adams portraits. And you'll learn about them!

ABOUT THE JFK PORTRAIT -  Artist Elaine de Kooning, known for her contemporary, gestural portraits, was chosen in 1962 to create a portrait of President Kennedy for the Truman Library because she worked quickly. She had seven informal sessions in Palm Beach, Florida, with Kennedy at the end of December 1962 and early January 1963. De Kooning was so moved by Kennedy that over the next ten months she created hundreds of drawings and twenty-three paintings of him. This full-length image captures Kennedy’s restless energy, and its colors evoke a coolness and detachment not always obvious to his admirers. After Kennedy’s assassination on November 22, 1963,

John Adams, 2nd President

the artist stopped painting for a year.

JOHN ADAMS PORTRAIT MYSTERY SOLVED  - It seems this portrait of the 2nd U.S. President was mistakenly attributed to artist Gilbert Stuart. It was later discovered that the painting was the work of John Turnbull (See the museum website) 
  

Exhibition Label

Second president, 1797–1801

Of all the Founding Fathers, John Adams was perhaps the most intellectual and accomplished. He helped craft the argument supporting the independence of the Continental Congress and later served on the diplomatic mission that ended the Revolutionary War. When George Washington chose him as his vice president, Adams complained that his lack of official duties meant that he occupied “the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived.” Nevertheless, he used the position as his ticket to the presidency and was elected in 1796 after a bitter campaign against Thomas Jefferson. During Adams’s single term as president, political posturing and bickering inhibited him at home, and France’s interference with American commerce created a challenge for him abroad. Adams managed to keep the nation at peace, but he left the White House largely discredited on all sides.

     When Adams was vice president, he had portraits done by the artist John Trumbull, who based this painting on one of those original portraits. Trumbull incorporated the likeness into his depiction of the signing of the Declaration of Independence that is on display in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda.

 NEXT: Part 4: Bill Clinton, FDR, Eleanor Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln and George Washington

Good, Short Read: Superman Novelization: Doomsday and Beyond, by Louise Simonson

Since there's a new DC Comics animated film about the "Rise of the Supermen" you may be interested in a young-adult novelization of the story (that's a good, quick read of 190 pages). It's called  Superman: : Doomsday and Beyond, by Louise Simonson. (Bantam, 1993).- It's a story about 4 characters who appeared and resemble in some way, and claim to be Superman after he temporarily died in a 1993 story line.
   I have the whole story in comic book form that covered 1 plus years of comics, but this provided a good, short, summarized version of that long story (the comic books in trade paperback are about 3 inches thick).
  Louise Simonson has always been a great comic book writer, and she did a fantastic job on this novelization. As a bonus for comics readers, there are a couple of illustrations by famous comics artists Dan Jurgens and Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez.
   Well-worth the read! (if you can get an old copy... I think it's out of print).

Idiots of the Week: Virginia Study Finds Increased School Bullying In Areas That Voted For Trump

Here's a study that just came out about bullying in certain parts of Virginia. Its really about more idiots in the news. The results are not surprising at all... 

Virginia Study Finds Increased School Bullying In Areas That Voted For Trump

January 9, 2019 3:32 PM ET

Clare Lombardo/

Ryan Johnson for NPR 

 

After the 2016 presidential election, teachers across the country reported they were seeing increased name-calling and bullying in their classrooms. Now, research shows that those stories — at least in one state — are confirmed by student surveys.

Francis Huang of the University of Missouri and Dewey Cornell of the University of Virginia used data from a school climate survey taken by over 150,000 students across Virginia. They looked at student responses to questions about bullying and teasing from 2015 and 2017. Their findings were published Wednesday in Educational Researcher, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Educational Research Association.

What Kids Think About Bullying And Kindness In The Trump Era

In the 2017 responses, Huang and Cornell found higher rates of bullying and certain types of teasing in areas where voters favored Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.
Seventh- and eighth-graders in areas that favored Trump reported bullying rates in spring 2017 that were 18 percent higher than students living in areas that went for Clinton. They were also 9 percent more likely to report that kids at their schools were teased because of their race or ethnicity.
In the 2015 data, there were "no meaningful differences" in those findings across communities, the researchers wrote.

These findings come at a time when school bullying rates nationally have remained relatively flat, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Findings from the CDC's Youth Risk Behavior Survey show that about 1 in 5 students were bullied at school in 2017. .

Teachers Report Stressed, Anxious Students In The 'Age Of Trump'

Huang, an associate professor of education, says the overall stable number fits with the state-level findings from his research with Cornell: While bullying rates in areas of Virginia that voted Republican went up in 2017, rates went down in places that favored Clinton.
"If, in one area, bullying rates go up, and, in another area, your bullying rates go down, what do you get?" he asks. "You get an average of no change."

The researchers took pains to note that their research does not conclude that President Trump's election caused an increase in bullying. Instead, they found a correlation between voter preference and bullying, and they observed teasing across one state.

Their findings could lend credence to the anecdotal reports from teachers around the country after the election, says Dorothy Espelage, a psychology professor at the University of Florida who researches bullying and school safety in middle and high schools.

"Anybody that's in the schools is picking up on this," she says. "You don't have to be a psychologist or a sociologist to understand that if these conversations are happening on the TV and at the dinner table that these kids will take this perspective and they're going to play out in the schools."

A nationally representative survey conducted in the fall of 2017 showed that just 14 percent of 9- to 11-year-olds believe that the country's leaders model how to treat others with kindness — and 70 percent said it would help kids their age to be kinder if adults in charge of the country set a better example.

 What Teens Really Say About Sex, Drugs And Sadness

"Parents should be mindful of how their reactions to the presidential election, or the reactions of others, could influence their children," Cornell, a psychologist and professor of education at UVA, said in a statement. "And politicians should be mindful of the potential impact of their campaign rhetoric and behavior on their supporters and indirectly on youth."
Regardless of where and how it happens, adds Francis Huang, "bullying is something that can still be addressed and brought down in schools."

Source: https://www.npr.org/2019/01/09/683177489/virginia-study-finds-increased-school-bullying-in-areas-that-voted-for-trump?fbclid=IwAR10EUsKRJ0VsAsOUEpsE7VUSLmiav_j3J_TzdKC2YGbpURjGoeEcyJUvhw

Part 2: National Portrait Gallery: The Obamas

Rob & Tom in front of Pres. Obama's portrait

This is part 2 of our visit to the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery to see some amazing paintings on display there. The two portraits that we went specifically to see were President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. It was a thrill to see them.  

On Feb. 12, 2018, the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery unveiled its commissioned portraits of former President Barack Obama and Mrs. Michelle Obama by artists Kehinde Wiley and Amy Sherald, respectively. It took us a YEAR to get there to see them, and they were worth the wait. 

The portraits are in TWO different places in the museum. Former President Barack Obama's portrait can be seen in the America's Presidents gallery on the museum's second floor. Former First Lady Michelle Obama's portrait is featured in the 20th Century Americans gallery on the museum's first floor.

ABOUT THE ARTIST AND PAINTING OF PRESIDENT OBAMA -Artist Kehinde Wiley is known for his vibrant, large-scale paintings of African Americans posing as famous figures from the history of Western art. This portrait does not include an underlying art historical reference, but some of the flowers in the background carry special meaning for Obama. The chrysanthe­mums, for example, reference the official flower of Chicago. The jasmine evokes Hawaii, where he spent the majority of his childhood, and the African blue lilies stand in for his late Kenyan father.
Kehinde Wiley (born 1977)/ Oil on canvas, 2018
  
ABOUT THE ARTIST AND PAINTING OF MRS. OBAMA -
Mrs. Obama selected Amy Sherald, winner of the 2016 Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition, to create her official portrait for the museum. The Baltimore-based artist considers the former first lady to be someone “women can relate to—no matter what shape, size, race, or color. . . . We see our best selves in her.” Here, she portrays Mrs. Obama as both confident and approachable, in a dress by Michelle Smith’s label Milly.
Amy Sherald (born 1973) / Oil on linen, 2018

NEXT: Part 3: 2 Portraits of Presidents from Massachusetts