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Treasure Hunt Write Off ~ 1959

Jun 11 '04

The Bottom Line let's put the bottom line in a time capsule and not open it for a millennium or two

Annie_Crane is hosting the Treasure Hunt Write Off. The object is to look for items invented the year you were born and for other details that are listed below, if you can provide a link that would be great. We could check out the facts and beef up on our history. Also provide a brief summary on the topic. It doesn’t have to be long unless you want to give more details. Please no false answers though.

Here ya go, Annie!

1) One invention the year you were born. It can be anything from a food item to a car.
In 1959, Barbie was invented by Ruth Handler and Mattel. Barbie was named after Ruth's daughter. Also, the Frisbee which started out with the tossing of empty pie tins by college students in the 1940s; Wham-O marketed them as "Flyin' Saucers" on the west coast in 1957, changed the name to Frisbee in 1959, started a nationwide craze. Pantyhose was invented in 1959 by Allen Gant of North Carolina, USA, in 1959. Miniskirts were the fashion and pantyhose replaced stockings and garters. And here’s one for puckmugger: On November 1, 1959 New York Ranger Andy Bathgate hit Montreal Canadien goalie Jacques Plante with a shot off the face. Plante left the game to get stitched up returned wearing a mask he had made himself for practices, and then won the game. This was the birth of the goalie mask. Plante was ridiculed for wearing this mask, and goaltenders were thought of as cowards if they thought of wearing a mask. Plante would often say "If you jump from an airplane without a parachute, is that considered an act of bravery?".

2) Who was the most famous actor/actress the year you were born.
I'd go with Cary Grant, although it could be one of many others. He starred in North by Northwest in 1959, one of my favourite movies.

3) Most popular vehicle the year you were born.
Don't know what the most popular vehicle was the year I was born, but I know I sure wouldn't say no to a 1959 Corvette right now!

4) Which president was in office and what did he do for our country that was different, either good or bad.
President: Dwight D. Eisenhower
Vice President: Richard M. Nixon
Good or bad? Well, being Canadian it's not for me to judge, but seeing the name Nixon there as VP, that strikes me as a bad omen.

Other world events in 1959
Cuban President Batista resigns and flees (Jan. 1). Fidel Castro assumes power (Feb. 16).
Tibet's Dalai Lama escapes to India (Mar. 31).
Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev tours the United States, meeting with Eisenhower at Camp David.
Britain recognizes the independence of Cyprus .


5) One hit movie
It would seem that many listmakers agree, and this is what I found:
The Best of 1959
Alfred Hitchcock: North By Northwest/ Intrigo Internazionale
Mario Monicelli: La Grande Guerra/ Great War
Billy Wilder: Some Like It Hot
Alain Resnais: Hiroshima Mon Amour
Jean-Luc Godard: A Bout de Souffle/ Breathless

Academy Award, Best Picture: Gigi , Arthur Freed, producer (MGM)
Best Actor: David Niven, Separate Tables
Best Actress: Susan Hayward, I Want to Live!

6) Something from the top ten category in music.
1959 was the time of the Teen Idols. The number one hit of the year was Bobby Darin's Mack the Knife. Also in the Top Ten that year was Frankie Avalon's Venus. Paul Anka had hits with Lonely Boy and Put Your Head on My Shoulder

In other music news in 1959:
In February of 1959, a plane crash took the lives of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper. Don McLean eloquently chronicled the demise of Rock’s early spirit, in his son American Pie, which refers to the deaths of these three musical legends and the changes in rock as well.

7) Any item of your choice to mention from the year you were born.

Alaska and Hawaii become the forty-ninth and fiftieth states. In children's literature, The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare won the Newberry Award in 1959, and Chanticleer and the Fox, illustrated by Barbara Cooney; text: adapted from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales by Barbara Cooney won the Caldecott Award.
Fiction bestsellers:
1. Exodus, Leon Uris
2. Doctor Zhivago, Boris Pasternak
3. Hawaii, James Michener
4. Advise and Consent, Allen Drury
5. Lady Chatterley's Lover, D. H. Lawrence
6. The Ugly American, William J. Lederer and Eugene L. Burdick
7. Dear and Glorious Physician, Taylor Caldwell
8. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
9. Mrs. 'Arris Goes to Paris, Paul Gallico
10. Poor No More, Robert Ruark
Non-fiction bestsellers:
1. 'Twixt Twelve and Twenty, Pat Boone
2. Folk Medicine, D. C. Jarvis
3. For 2¢ Plain, Harry Golden
4. The Status Seekers, Vance Packard
5. Act One, Moss Hart
6. Charley Weaver's Letters from Mamma, Cliff Arquette
7. The Elements of Style, William Strunk Jr. and E. B. White
8. The General Foods Kitchens Cookbook
9. Only in America, Harry Golden
10. Mine Enemy Grows Older, Alexander King

Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction: The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters, Robert Lewis Taylor
Music: Concerto for Piano and Orchestra, John La Montaine
Drama: J. B. Archibald MacLeish


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