Monday, December 19, 2011

As we celebrate The Holiday Season...December 20, "Osmond Day!"

.


As you can see, my nifty free National Wildlife Federation calendar on the wall lists no "official Holiday" on December 20. But, some awful interesting things happened on this date.


In 1944, Dwight Eisenhower was promoted to General of The Army. (Thanks to BR for catching my error).


In 1879, Thomas Edison first demonstrated the incandescent bulb.  YOU GO TOMMY!


And, in 1860, SouCahlina seceded from The Nyunited States!  (I will NOT go there, even though I'm tempted).


And, a whole lot of interesting folks croaked on this day, too.


In 2001, the "lovable lush," Foster Brooks passed.  Hey, a great Foster Brooks quote:






















But, if I had to pick an event that ought to be celebrated (especially in the Holiday Season), I'd say it is this one.   

On December 20, 1962, The Osmond Brothers made their debut on The Andy Williams Show singing the American classic, "I'm a Ding Dong Daddy from Dumas."   (now, what is more holidayish than the Andy Williams show?  Answer me that!)

Anybody that knows anything about pop culture knows that the careers of the Osmond Brothers/Family/whatever were launched by Mr. Andy Williams, and his personal popularity.  America would have been a different place had the Osmond phenomenon not got started somewhere.

The Osmonds are a piece of Americana...a slice of American Pie...a patch in the quilt of whatsoever junk that we remember!  


Thanks, Mr. Andy Williams!  

I guess...


Now, before we get to the video, we need to discuss the controversy about the song, "I'm a Ding Dong Daddy from Dumas."  And, controversy there is! 

Trust me, there is.


It seems that the writer of the song, one Phil Baxter, once lived in the town of Dumas, Texas, so Texans claim that this song was writ about someone being "from" their West Texas town.  On the flipside, Dumas stinkin' Arkansas (which I traveled through regularly for four miserable years) also claims from time to time (with no documentation) that the classic should be attributed to their fair hamlet.  

And, the lyrics do seem to favor the Dumas, stinkin' Arkansas argument...somewhat.  When they talk about Whampus Kitties...well, that's an Arkansas thing which we have discussed before on this here Titanic of a glob.

Nyuk...if you visit the Dumas, stinkin' Arkansas Wickedpedia page you'll see the photo that they sport.  It is captioned, "The Fred's store after it was hit by the tornado."  I kid you not...


As a side note, my older brother and I were pulled over by a Texas State Trooper in August of 1977 en route to Colorado for going 105 in a 65.  My brother was driving (I do NOT speed) my beloved Granddaddy's Pontiac Grand Safari Station Wagon that we camped out in on our big adventure.  That bigass State Trooper hauled us down to the courthouse, where a female judge charged us roughly ONE HUNDRED BUCKS to let us get the hell out of Dumas, TX.  

That was a lot of money in 1977.  Just sayin'...


So, I have been to both Dumas, Texas, and Dumas stinkin' Arkansas, and I can tell you that I have not one fond memory of either.


But, ya' gotta love The Osmond Brothers on The Andy Williams Show.

Now that I have a The YOU TUBE account, I could download this, trim it off, and put just the performance part in it, and download it back up to the YouTube, but that is WAY too much trouble.  So, just fast forward to 1:25 to see the slice of American Pie/piece of Americana/whatever.





So, from here on out, at Andy's Place we shall celebrate December 20th as "Osmond Day!"


10 comments:

  1. Happy Osmond's day to you Andy. Good video, I liked the Osmonds!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Minor historical correction: On Dec. 20, 1944, Ike was promoted to General of the Army (5 star). He was promoted to General on Feb. 11, 1943.

    I'm sure all the rest of that stuff is correct.

    Happy Osmond's day. Oh, why were they singing about someone's ding dong?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Dave, my bad! Meant to say "General of the Army." I shall correct that.

    AS to the question, I have ZERO idea...

    ReplyDelete
  4. Dumas, TX, is on the route from my home to Red River. As a kid we often stopped there to eat or spend the night. I learned to swim at the Phillips Manor Motel in Dumas. And that is about all Dumas has going for it.

    I had quite the crush on Donny O in my day.

    ReplyDelete
  5. In 1976, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley died.

    He still votes, though... like thousands of his constituents in a similar state o' bein'. That state would be ILL-in-oise, of course.

    You'll forgive me for not watching your clip, wontcha? It's early (for me) and I don't wanna ruin my day.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Lou, I didn't even know that Dumas, TX had THAT MUCH going for it. Of course you had a crush on Donny. So did EVERY GIRL IN MY JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL!!!!

    Dangit...

    Buck, you are SO predictable. I was waiting for that one. Thank you for not disappointing me.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Andy, you can also fiddle with YouTube's embed codes to make yer vid start at a certain point. I've only done it a couple times so I have to refresh my memory with a gooblesearch every time I try it. Something like adding "&start=85" at the end of the code.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Hey thanks, Inno! Imma look in to that. It might lessen the pain for codgers that don't want to look at The Osmonds stellar work for very long. (Said Codger shall remain nameless)

    ReplyDelete
  9. Happy Osmond Day~ I didn't have a crush on him but my sister did.

    ReplyDelete
  10. My father was born inDumas, AR, so he is literally a ding dong daddy from Dumas. Or, is saying that kinda creepy?

    That Fred's was wiped out by the tornado. And the Exxon. Fortunately, the Sonic was spared.

    ReplyDelete

Don't cuss nobody out, okay?