"EYEBROW $10" BECOMES COUNTRY'S FIRST OFFICIAL CIVIC ICON
GLENDALE, Calif. -- Glendale, a city of 200,000 on the eastern border of Los Angeles, today became the first American municipality to adopt a picture as a motto.
"This just says who we are better than 'Vox et lex populi' or whatever it was," said Mayor Thomas F. Gilchrist (Glendale actually had no motto before today - ED). "And there aren't too many American cities - maybe New York with the Brooklyn Bridge or Los Angeles with the Hollywood sign - that could whip out a single image and say all it needed to say about the whole town like 'Eyebrow $10' says about us."
The striking motto/logo will now adorn all civic mailings and be emblazoned on city property at a cost to taxpayers of approximately $3.2 million. It was described by artist Belle Geddes-Irving as a "thought collage."
Geddes-Irving said that the inspiration for "Eyebrow $10" came to her in a dream. She tentatively approached the City about using the image as a mural but was surprised when it was immediately adopted as the City Seal.
"It's both groundbreaking and a sign of the times," said resident Ray McBride. "It suggests social networking avatars and it's really representative of the area."
Indeed, as recent studies chart the decline of the use and knowledge of Latin across the country, everyone from schoolchildren to city employees cannot read their own civic seals.
Cultural observer Martin Barrett points out that, even when translated, ancient mottos might no longer describe the place for which they were written.
"...and in that regard, Glendale, chartered in 1921, was forward-thinking because it used no motto," he said. "But I believe 'Eyebrow $10' says 'Glendale' better than any string of words in a dead language could."
Gilchrist and Geddes-Irving unveiled the new Seal today at City Hall, after which it was paraded down Brand Blvd. by a fleet of leased Lexuses fueled entirely by Drakkar-Noir.
Barack Obama took the oath of office today as the 44th President of the United States, continuing an unbroken succession of leaders dating back two centuries.
George Washington started many traditions in the inaugural inaugural in 1789, including using a Bible. It is worth noting that "So help me God" is not part of the official oath, and is one of the many traditions adopted by Washington's successors.
Some other Inauguration Day traditions were not as well-publicized, however, and I include them below.
Thomas Jefferson (1801). Dubious of Christ's divinity but also of residual leanings toward the monarchy in the young country, took oath of office on a deck of cards with the four kings removed. When Chief Justice John Marshall, an ally of defeated president John Adams, asked about the jokers, Jefferson replied "Well, I do speak of the pompatus of love, sir."
William Henry Harrison (1841). In place of "So help me God" said, "Unless I die of pneumonia in 30 days and am of no use to you, sir."
James K. Polk (1845). Instituted practice of having someone else pay for pre-inaugural brunch, but would cover tip.
Abraham Lincoln (1865). The 16th president's more relaxed second inaugural included a Rose Garden game of Catch Mary Todd with a Butterfly Net, Because She's Crazy. Mary Todd would continue this tradition until James Garfield's inauguration in 1881, at which point Vice President Chester Arthur caught and subdued the former First Lady, but good.
Grover Cleveland (1885). When Chief Justice Morrison Waite administered the oath of office, said "Grover. Really. Your name is Grover." Presidents until Calvin Coolidge (1923) would ceremonially offer a coin to the Chief Justice just before the oath and declare "Verily I say unto thee my name be not Grover."
Benjamin Harrison (1889). Like his relative William Henry, showed a gift for prophecy when he quipped "Feels like a Grover sandwich up in here" in his inaugural address. Having narrowly defeated predecessor Cleveland in the election of 1888, was succeeded by Cleveland in 1893.
Warren Harding (1921). As the new president's entourage headed to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Harding suddenly withdrew a pistol and shot a donkey between the eyes, but only wounded the animal. The "Wandering Donkey" would be wheeled out and shot at by presidents until Roosevelt's fourth inaugural (1945), at which point a cranky, ailing FDR simply rolled over the beast with his wheelchair.
Lyndon Johnson (1965). Roped a secretary from the typing pool, dragged her length of a regulation longhorn pen (325 feet). Tradition continued until Gerald Ford (1974) confused the practice with Harding's and shot Secretary of the Interior Rogers Morton between the eyes.
Bill Clinton (1993). Took a bite out of inauguration poet Maya Angelou, thinking "she was a lifesize cake." Echoed apocryphal story that John F. Kennedy (1961) did the same to poet Robert Frost. Some evidence of this exists, as Frost delivered a speech two weeks later at the University of New Hampshire with a sizable bite taken out of him.
George W. Bush (2001). In keeping with manner of acquiring the presidency, stole bath towels, tablecloths, and warming trays from each hotel his family stayed in between the election and assumption of office. Also added "Says You" to each line of oath.
Barack Obama (2009). Heard to mutter "What do we pay you for?" to mush-mouthed Chief Justice John Roberts, continuing occasional under-the-breath barbs to Chief Justice traditions of John Quincy Adams/John Marshall (1825), Rutherford Hayes/Morrison Waite (1877), and William Howard Taft/Melville Fuller (1909), who said "Dullard," "You're fat," and "Fuller my boot in your ass" respectively.
Barack Obama's recent photo opportunity with the current (for 12 more hours) and three former presidents is part of a journalistic tradition that delights in getting like things in the same place, like squishing puppies together.
Throughout U.S. history there have never been more than four former presidents in the same room with the current one, and that was during the term of the first George Bush, when Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, and Richard Nixon all picked up their dry cleaning on the same historic day.
That said, in 2000 and 1994 there were five living former presidents along with the sitting one, just not in the same room.
Mostly, though, presidents haven't lived long enough to collect more than a few at a time. Here is a picture of Theodore Roosevelt (left) with William Howard Taft, his successor. Note that Taft, our heaviest president, looks more like Teddy than Teddy does. The guy in the window also showed up in "Three Men And A Baby," as part of the just-as-revered presidential tradition of homage to the undead.
Presidential wives tend to outlast their husbands, but even though Lady Bird Johnson and Betty Ford were alive when this photo was taken, widows don't get to come to the photo opps.
Funerals are also good for getting presidents together, as in the case of Richard Nixon's in 1994.
Inaugurations, not so much, as many immediately-former presidents tend to high-tail it out of town. Still, at John F. Kennedy's inauguration in 1963, both Kennedy's Republican predecessor, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Ike's Democratic precursor, Harry Truman, were on hand.
Truman, who lived to be 92, returned to the White House during the administrations of Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson.
Here's Franklin Roosevelt and the tremendously unpopular (at the time) man he replaced, Herbert Hoover. The Roosevelt/Hoover connection is most often compared to Obama/Bush, as Obama, like Roosevelt, is inheriting a financial catastrophe from his predecessor. Whoever thought to put these two in the same car was an idiot, but it was the Depression, and maybe they needed to carpool?
William Henry Harrison, who took office in 1841, gave a rousing two-hour speech in the cold without his overcoat, and died of pneumonia 30 days later (although he did not fall ill for three weeks after the inauguration). His was the shortest term of any U.S. president. He wasn't around long enough to get his picture taken with anybody.
Growing up on the hardscrabble streets of Primm can be gritty, and mean, and grim, not to mention hardscrabble. It is not lost on local residents that "grim" even rhymes with the name of their town.
"Not lost on me at all," said Whiskey Pete's croupier Vera Morgan. "In fact, before I got into Sudoku I would randomly rhyme words together, and 'grim' was the first word I landed on after I said 'Primm.' Sometimes I even forgot to go for the obvious one, 'prim,' because it just didn't seem appropriate."
I will be hosting an 18-part series on the history of this Nevada border town that is more roller coaster than town. In fact, I will even launch a website called Grim Primm. I see it's available. In fact, I see the rest of my life neatly laid out before me. You would be envious of the certainty I possess.
One gets so full of ideas after a long drive and a stop for coffee in Hesperia and nowhere to relieve oneself, doesn't one?
The leader of the Istari says, "It reminds me of the foothills of cruel Caradhras, under which dwells the Balrog of Moria. Hesperia is a town of shadow and flame" while the scourge of Yukon Cornelius calls the San Bernardino County hotspot "the Glendale of the high desert."
"EYEBROW $10" BECOMES COUNTRY'S FIRST OFFICIAL CIVIC ICON
