Friday, August 19, 2011

   
[1785 - Seth Thomas, clock maker, born in Wolcott, Connecticut]

[1812 - USS Constitution defeats HMS Guerriere in a sea battle]

   
[1870 - Bernard (Mannes) Baruch, financier, statesman, presidential advisor, born in Camden, South Carolina]

[1871 - Orville Wright, aviator, born in Dayton, Ohio]

   
[1902 - (Frederick) Ogden Nash, poet, humorist, born in Rye, New York]

   
[1903 - James Gould Cozzens, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, born in Chicago]

   
[1903 - Claude (Legrand) Dauphin (Franc-Nohain), actor, born in Corbeil-Essonnes, Paris]

[1909 - The first race at the Indianapolis 500 Speedway is held]

      
[1915 - Ring Lardner, Jr. (Ringgold Wilmer Lardner, Jr.), Academy Award-winning screenwriter, born in Chicago]

[1916 - Marie (Katherine Elizabeth) Wilson (Fallon), actress, comedienne, born in Anaheim, California]

   
[1919 - Malcolm Stevenson Forbes, publisher, capitalist, born in Brooklyn]

      
[1921 - Gene Roddenberry, executive producer Star Trek, born in El Paso, Texas]

[1924 - William Horace Marshall, actor, born in
Gary, Indiana]

[1929 - Sergei P. Diaghilev, founder
Ballets Russes, dies at age 57]

   
[1931 - William Lee 'Willie' Shoemaker, jockey, born in Fabens, Texas]

Owed to Ogden Nash

Most say Ogden Nash was a comic poet.
Just read him and you will surely know it.
Now, was he a comic who set his work to verse,
Or a poet with a vision of a world perverse?

He is gone now; he no Baby-boomer.
But his writings preserve his sense of humor.
Who cares if his verse took liberties with meter.
If liquor is quicker, why candy is sweeter.

Gently he wrote of animals and children.
He described them in ways that with whimsy filled them.
He spoke to us of the cow and the camel.
With imagination that was untrammel.

William's Whimsical Words:

I admit that you are more clever than I.
You will never be mistaken for a Ham from Rye.
I salute you, dear Ogden, in your sleep,
And pray this won't make you Nash your teeth.

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