On Sunday November 24 1963, detectives were escorting Lee Harvey Oswald through the basement of Dallas Police Headquarters toward an armored car that was to take him from the city jail (located on the fourth floor of police headquarters) to the nearby county jail. At 11:21 a.m. CST, Dallas nightclub operator Jack Ruby approached Oswald from the side of the crowd and shot him once in the abdomen at close range. As the shot rang out, a police detective suddenly recognized Ruby and exclaimed: "Jack, you son of a bitch!"  The crowd outside the headquarters burst into applause when they heard that Oswald had been shot. It is thought that Ruby walked up the Main Street Ramp, although the officer stationed there, Patrolman Roy Vaughn, swore to his dying day he did not.  He may have been mistaken, or maybe Ruby used a stairway adjacent to an alley.  The Dallas police and Sheriff's departments were used to violence, but nothing like the assassination had been a...

  So, I'm looking up the Casa Loma Orchestra and I find out that their big hit was Girl Of My Dreams, which was used very well in an excellent movie, Angel Heart. I'm reading the comments on You Tube and it seemed like everybody there knew the movie inside out just like I do.  This caught my eye: Deana Kathaleen - Mickey Rourke looks like the cowardly lion now. A seven year old comment.  But let us see if this observation has a grounding in truth. Mickey Rourke. The Cowardly Lion. A big shout out to Deana Kathaleen for this priceless, blue ribbon wisecrack.  Take that, youth and glory! Voodoo!

From The Adventures Of Reynard, Benjamin Rabier. Well!  Another earthquake. Allow me to shelter you under my umbrella! Sociable animals listening to a phonograph.  What?  You didn't know that France had lions? https://www.history.com/news/beast-gevaudan-france-theories       The loup garou, or werewolf.   What makes them different from the common werewolf is that they don't change with the cycles of the moon and have complete change over their actions. So, what makes these creatures so dangerous and terrifying is the fact that while in their wolf form they are completely aware and as intelligent as they are in their human form. With their enhanced abilities and senses, it make them difficult to destroy. These are magnificent, intelligent and blessed creatures (in some tales), but beware le Loup Garou…    Josephine.   "It turns out that the original laughing cow was thought up by a well-known cartoonist Benjamin Rabier when he was...

 Our fellow Hybrid member Nat-ti made me aware of this artist, Felix Lorioux, who was one of France’s best loved artists.  He was a humble, quiet man who did little to promote himself beyond his home country. He was born in 1872 and began as a advertising designer. But his childlike sense of wonder led him to a career as a children’s book illustrator. Walt Disney met him in 1919 when Disney was an Red Cross ambulance driver and Lorioux’s wife ws a Red Cross nurse. Disney was impressed with his abilities and hired him to illustrate books for the French market based on Mickey Mouse and the Silly Symphonies.  A Lorioux illustration of a duck in a sailor suit may have even been the inspiration for Donald Duck! Around 1934, Lorioux resigned from illustrating for Disney, citing the language barrier and also because he didn’t want to relocate to California to join the studio. https://animationresources.org/illustration-felix-loriouxs-fantastic-worlds/    In ...

  A short short featuring Draknor the barbarian.  The Fiend In Iron The forest was calming, perhaps too calming for such a seasoned warrior as Draknor. The Dracoz stood a good seven feet tall, ducking low hanging branches as his bare clawed feet padded across the forest floor. A ragged cloak hung from the creature’s shoulders, bits of cloth and leather covered his torso and simple trousers covered his legs. The rest of his exposed body was covered in black reptilian scales, his eyes a baleful yellow and two long horns protruded straight from his draconic head. There was no mistaking Draknor for anything else. It was well past noon as the woodland creatures called their cries. Draknor sniffed the air for anything unusual. He knew he was not far from a sizeable town, but wished to avoid it. He tended to attract attention, and he did not wish for his presence to be known. Draknor stuck to the less-traveled paths. Humans often called his kind barbarians, the thought made Draknor s...