Doomsday Flight

The Doomsday Flight was a 1966 TV movie written by Rod Serling. The plot involves "a disgruntled aerospace engineer" who phones in a threat warning that he's planted a barometric pressure bomb on an airliner set to explode when the plane descends below 4000 feet for landing. He demands a ransom in return for instructions on how to disable the bomb. There isn't really a bomb, but the pilot nevertheless figures out how to defeat the scheme by landing at Denver, 5000 feet above sea level.

The movie is apparently pretty good. So good, in fact, that it soon earned an odd place in film history as The Movie Too Dangerous For The Public To See. Whenever it was shown, it inspired a slew of copycat bomb hoaxes, eventually leading the FAA, in 1971, to send a letter to TV stations, requesting that they never show it again. The FAA's letter warned that "the film may have a highly emotional impact on some unstable individual and stimulate him to imitate the fictional situation in the movie."

TV stations honored the FAA's request, and to my knowledge have never aired it again. It eventually was released on VHS (Available on Amazon), and there may be a DVD of it available (though not on Netflix). But you won't see it on TV.

You can find a fuller version of this movie's history here and here.

Posted By: Alex - Thu Oct 30, 2014 - Comments (8)
Category: Movies, 1960s

Okee the Painting Otter

A forgotten giant of the art world. Source: The Santa Cruz Sentinel - Apr 7, 1965.

Posted By: Alex - Tue Oct 28, 2014 - Comments (4)
Category: Animals, Art, 1960s

Raffaella Carra & The Beatles

Best Beatles cover versions ever! The singer.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Oct 15, 2014 - Comments (6)
Category: Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Music, Pop Art, 1960s, 1970s

Dion McGregor

Full explanation here. In short, recordings of a man unconsciously narrating his dreams.

Full album below.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Oct 12, 2014 - Comments (3)
Category: Dreams and Nightmares, Eccentrics, 1960s

Mystery Balloons

In 1967, the U.S. Coast Guard found a crate containing seven inflated yellow balloons floating off the coast of Florida. The crate was marked "made in U.S.S.R." and was addressed to "The institute of mineral resources of Cuba."

Why were the Soviets shipping seven balloons to Cuba? Why were the balloons inflated? How did the crate end up floating in the ocean? As far as I know, these questions remain unanswered.

Posted By: Alex - Fri Oct 10, 2014 - Comments (15)
Category: Unsolved Mysteries, 1960s

Remco Land-Mine

Toy land-mines have definitely gone out of fashion. Hakes Collectibles explains that the toy was "designed with a trip wire which you were to attach to tree or other stationary object and when wire was bumped, grenade would shoot in the air and cap would fire on base." Also, the toy was "similar to actual weapons used in the Vietnam war."

Posted By: Alex - Wed Oct 08, 2014 - Comments (11)
Category: Toys, 1960s, Weapons

Anti-Booze PSA

Way to harsh my buzz, man!

Posted By: Paul - Fri Oct 03, 2014 - Comments (3)
Category: PSA’s, 1960s, Alcohol

The Art of the Diseuse

Not sure these recorded performances capture whatever unique brilliance these performers were reputed to exhibit.

In the December 21, 1935 edition of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette an entertainment columnist wrote: “The English language does not contain a word which perfectly describes the performance of Ruth Draper, who comes to the Nixon next Thursday for the first time in several years to give a different program at each of her four performances here. “Speaking Portraits” and “Character Sketches” are the two terms most frequently applied to Miss Draper's work; and yet it is something more than that. “Diseuse” is the French word, but that is more readily applicable to an artist like Yvette Guilbert or Raquel Meller. Monologist is wholly inadequate. The word “Diseuse” really means “an artist in talking” so that may be the real term to use in connection with Miss Draper.” Actresses who have been called noted diseuses over the years include Yvette Guilbert, Ruth Draper, Joyce Grenfell, Cornelia Otis Skinner, Lucienne Boyer, Raquel Meller, Odette Dulac, Beatrice Herford, Kitty Cheatham, Marie Dubas, Claire Waldoff, Lina Cavalieri, Françoise Rosay, Molly Picon, Corinna Mura, Lotte Lenya.

Source of quote.

Posted By: Paul - Mon Sep 29, 2014 - Comments (5)
Category: Performance Art, 1930s, 1960s