Myrna Loy's Jodphurs from 1935...

http://www.profilesinhistory.com/index3.php?option=com_auctions&catid=37&task=view2&id=16271

Puhleese?...

Thank you for taking the poll!

I am partly dismayed that despite my Cagney fandom I've failed to impress on about 50% of you what to do when I menace you with a grapefruit or grapefruit-related product, but that is trivial compared to my happiness the 50% of you also wanted to be enlightened about the reference!

Cagney's grapefruit scene is one of the most famous of his career. It's from his breakthrough movie "The Public Enemy" (1931). The actress in this scene is Mae Clarke, actually a lovely actress, and she had a love/hate relationship with this scene, since it defined and limited her, but it also gave her some fame and recognition.

The story goes that this scene was a Cagney-inspired addition, decided on the set and not in the script. Some versions say that Clarke was unaware of the twist this was going to take, but Clarke herself says she was in on it, but that they did this version to get a rise out of an unsuspecting crew.

OK, one last thing before you watch - a couple disclaimers: 1) this is 1931 and talking movies are just wee babies, still not all that polished or confident even compared to what they'll be like in a couple years. 2) Cagney's character is despicable and is meant to be seen that way - he's a terrible, terrible guy: cruel, stupid, cowardly. I just don't want you to think that anyone felt this scene was filmed to be funny or praiseworthy or normal for the times.



( Continued with a couple more fun examples behind the cut. Click ya mug. )

It's James Cagney's birthday!!



In honour of Jim, I'll be writing a letter to Olivia de Havilland today to express my gratitude to her for her work. She stands apart in my personal pantheon of favorite actors and storytellers as a woman of great sensitivity, hard work and class. I challenge you to write to someone whose work has moved you, or told stories that you enjoyed, and thank them too. Do it without any expectation of a reply or reward.



And I'll also do my best today to convert any non-believers to the cult of Cagney!

George C Scott's Tribute to Cagney from Turner Classic Movies - includes clips, just under 5 minutes long:


( The Cags goes to my head like champagne, and I have posted TWO pictures plus a video embed before a cut! I know, I know! But I restrain my enthusiasm briefly and encourage you to click for MOAR!! )

... and your overcoat, and your 3-piece suit, and your tie, and your tommy-gun....

G-Man (Bale) vs Dillinger (Depp) on July 1!

Website with trailer and gallery, launched today:
http://publicenemies.net/

Rumour is that the trailer with play with "Watchmen" this week.

Tough Guys 4EVAR!!!!!

Holy cats! My ebay losing streak broke with a vengeance over the past couple days! It scares me a little, so I have to spread the wealth around a bit. I shouldn't go winning any of these, so instead, you should:

1. Vintage 30s DECO Cream SILK Ruffled Party Gown DRESS

I cannot bid on it - I bought a gorgeous silk 1930s gown with similar features in the fall (I almost wore it for New Year's. It's still looking for an event for it's unveiling):


( Continued behind the cut! )

Interrupting the update on my winter activities with an icon contest question for you...

Holly Black, a very fine YA author whose LJ I follow, has some advance copies of an anthology that she's co-edited. The anthology sounds spiffy - it's called Geektastic. She's planning to give away a couple of those advance copies to readers of her blog who enter an icon that fits the theme of Geekiness, or for one of the authors involved.

Her entry on the contest is here:
http://blackholly.livejournal.com/116915.html

I cannot resist. So here's some potential entries I made last night. Please vote for most winningest, and I'll use your opinions to decide on which to enter:

For these two I went with a sort of "original geek" theme, Geek version 1.0 if you will. The first is from the silent SF film, Metropolis. The second is a fun picture of the silent great Harold Lloyd:

Icon #1


Icon #2


These next two come from covers of "Weird Tales", a SF/horror pulp. These particular two both come from the early-mid 1930s:

Icon #3


Icon #4


Bonus icon I made from another pulp cover, it's not my favorite, but maybe some of you might like to see/steal it (all of my icons here are ok for you to take if you like - but credit me on your profile userpics page please.)

Time for another round-up of auction action.

OMGosh! Get a load of these chorus girl costumes! They are teeny tiny, but full of inspiration:

Tux:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=270318747545

Clown:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=270318739294

Gingham Girl:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=270318751047

Christmas Rockette:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=270318744908

( Continued behind the cut! )

I've been busy photographing my Hollywood pattern collection and adding them to the Vintage Pattern wiki. I'm also making a little pile of ones I might make this winter, so I thought I'd share pictures of those. Goodness I like sorting things into little piles. I bought comic-book protector sleeves and I've had fun putting all my vintage patterns in them. Anyway... Some of them I might have posted about before, but I think these are mostly new:

I can't resist cute Ruby Keeler. I want to make the one with full sleeves in silk - love the witchy pointy collar too. I can just picture wearing this and having no one know that Ruby Keeler is actually in their midst. I'll be like all Ruby Keeler in secret:

ETA: Since I was asked about the dates on these, I'll hazard some guesses, but I'm really just learning. This one is ca 1932? according to Cemetarian's dating of Hollywood patterns by their number, though this feels later to me mostly because of the styling on the envelope but also the fashion, though it's certainly from the 1930s.

( Continued behind the cut. )

I always like and am generally amused by xkcd, but this was one of the few times I LOL'd.

Some choice Burma-Shave jingles:

http://burma-shave.org/jingles/1934/your_beauty_boys

http://burma-shave.org/jingles/1951/proper

http://burma-shave.org/jingles/1939/makes_misses_mrs

http://burma-shave.org/jingles/1938/cheek_to_cheek

http://burma-shave.org/jingles/1937/my_neck_was

... my hands clamped over my ears, singing "LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" to the big bad world.

Well, not really. I have had a revelation about why love like the first half of the 20th Century. It's not that I want to escape to "simpler", "better" times or any hogwash like that. Far from it. I think I like it because they teach me that we can get through most anything. And not only can we get through it, but there will still be people of compassion, tolerance, intelligence and spirit through it all. And not only that - but we can look fantastic doing so.

So - some favorite things to revive the spirit: Vintage Clothes, Experimentation in Pastamentation, and well, it's been much too long, so I'll find a nice Cagney picture to round it off.

If you like vintage patterns, you might be aware that something awf'ly big is going down on ebay at the moment. A vintage pattern seller has a new MASSIVE (over 400) collection of Hollywood Patterns; mostly from the 1930s, mostly in beautiful condition, and mostly for sorta of a high price ($24 a piece and up.) It was too much for me to resist. Now that I've sated my thirst, I'm willing to share the find (in fact, I'd better, since I can hardly afford a second whirlwind buying spree like that). Find them here.
( Continued on behind the cut. )

And the cares that hang around me thro' the week
Seem to vanish like a gambler's lucky streak
When we're out together dancing, cheek to cheek...

I'm terrible at keeping any kind of secret, and I was going to leave pictures of this costume sort of locked until after DragonCon, but since it's white, long and fragile, this may be my best chance to share it in its pristine form. And besides that, it's been a long time since I've posted, and it will be a long time til I get a chance to post again.

So, don't click on the link if you would prefer to see it for its first time at DragonCon when I'm actually in it and have my makeup and all. But go ahead and click if you'd like to see the dress and wig.

Looking forward to seeing many of you at the Geek Mardi Gras we call DragonCon in the Lost City of Atlanta!

( Click on for pictures of the dress )

The title pretty much says it all - I've updated my muxtape to feature the Boswells. These ladies were wonderful - give them a listen:

http://youwantmyfedora.muxtape.com/

I was tickled to see 35 people call themselves a fan of my muxtape.

My life is not without its challenges and there's some stuff that is definitely Not Awesome about it, but I am moved to report on some of the more awesome aspects of my current life; even the small, mundane and pop-culture imbibing parts of it.

Recent Dinner I made last night and I'm proud of it:
Roast lamb, embedded with lavender and thyme (both from my garden), rosemary and garlic; drizzled with honey to glaze.
Roasted red bell pepper.
Steamed snap peas (I love those bags of snack snap peas!).
Watermelon, chevre, fresh basil and lime salad.
It was awesome!

Recent Movies watched at actual Theatres:
Get Smart (I loved this more than was good for me! Having had a mouse run up my clothes once, the rat scene nearly killed me. Awesomely funny!)
The Dark Knight (crazy awesome.)
Wall-E (beautifully awesome.)
Prince Caspian (melancholy-tinged awesome.)

Recent Movies watched at Home:
Golddiggers of 1935 (my kind of awesome! Busby Berkeley style! Even if it's a skeleton cast compared to the earlier Busbys.)
The Public Enemy (top 10 most awesome movies of all time, standing up awesomely well to repeated viewings.)

Recent Cocktails Invented:
The "Miss Lavendar" :
1 oz Rum
Muddled lavender from the garden
1/2 lime juiced
Shot of Grenadine
Club soda
Ice
It was gently awesome!

Recent Books Read:
"Un Lun Dun" by China Mieville - China Mieville is an awesome author, and this Young Adult book is fun, mildly twisted, mildly political, and sharply awesome.

"The Chinatown Death Cloud Peril" by Paul Malmont. I was perfectly in the mood for an off-beat novel with Pulp Fiction authors of 1937 as the protagonists. Awesomely suited to my needs, and a shoutout to the awesome defender75 for bringing it to my attention.

"The Arrival" by Shaun Tan - most awesome book of the year thus far! Seriously: beautiful, moving, intelligent, warm and universal. There have been few books I admire as much as this one. It was a wonderful and unexpected discovery after picking it up on a whim last week. It is a picture book for adults and bright, sensitive mature kids. Don't read too much about the book beforehand, just flip through the pages, get intrigued and start "reading" this wordless masterpiece. Let it take you on its journey, don't let the editorials or reviews tell you what it's about, discover it for yourself.

Awesome Bonus: there are at least 2 Anne of Green Gables references in this post. Can you find them?

More tidbits from the June 1933 Delineator. ( Click on for Lemon Meringue and Fluffy Ruffles. )

Back after a long hiatus, I'd love to share with you some highlights of the 1933 Delineator magazine. I have so much from the June edition that I'm going to split it up.

The cover is hysterical. I'm sure the bride is supposed to be looking off into her future, but instead I think she's rolling her eyes or something. Don't worry, the contents are more exciting than she seems to indicate.



( Bette Davis fashions, William Lyon Phelps sees the future of literature and we drink Pet Milk! All behind the cut! )

... but i eated it.

Actually. I didn't eat it. I muxed it? Boingboing.net tipped me off to this site (http://muxtape.com/) that you can upload 12 of your songs to and share them, thusly:

http://youwantmyfedora.muxtape.com/

It's a snippet of the songs that run around in my head and my iPod from 1919-1939. If this site stays up, I'll use it from time to time to share songs with you.

An interesting fact about myself: I wake up every morning with a song in my heart. Really, I do. Sometimes I have to listen quietly for a couple minutes before I recognise it. Sometimes I'm surprised that I remember enough of a song I barely heard for it to play back in such detail. I guess there's something about how quiet one's mind is in the morning.

In other news: soon I will have another pair of pants made. Son of DRAMA pants!

In a final grand gesture of frivolity before Dr Smith returned home last night from his vacation, I made a James Cagney video. I decided to focus on The Oklahoma Kid since I'm on an old West kick, the song choice was obvious to me, and I didn't want to do any topic that I was really invested in yet. So this was just to get my feet wet.

I know there's a green line on the edge. Drives me crazy - it isn't there when I watch the iMovie version of it, nor when saved as a .dv file. Everything else I've tried had it. Anyway, after hours of mucking around with things I don't really understand like 'codecs' and 'compressors', I'm just happy to get something uploaded that isn't too bad. The low image quality otherwise is really in the underlying source since The Oklahoma Kid is not on DVD.

One of my favorite parts of the movie is the discussion about 'Empire Building' between Cagney's character and the upstanding father of the love interest. It's an odd little political piece, and who can resist the line "I'm as social as a setter pup!". I decided to use it as a frame for the rest. ( The Youtube embed is behind the cut. )

... my day is complete.

BoingBoing just posted a link to the US Archives "Notable Registrants of the World War I Draft" and Jim, age 19, is among them:
http://www.archives.gov/southeast/wwi-draft/cagney.html

Actually, I found an image of his draft papers about a year ago - and a couple censuses that include him too. Yes, I am a year ahead of BoingBoing's curve! ;-) I'd forgotten that it described him though:

Color of Eyes: Gray
Color of Hair: Red

I don't know how he managed to get away without having his height recorded! It just says "Medium", when really, even for the time I think he was short. Though maybe since he was only 19 they figured he might grow a bit still.

I note Al Capone was 5'7".

Since we haven't done it for awhile, here's some JC picture swooning. The theme is Jim @home:


This is his boat, 1939 or so.

( 2 more behind the cut. )

Before Christmas I posted a preview of a little girl's apron I made from these free vintage patterns online:
http://www.dorothyshomegoods.com/articles.php?tPath=12

I didn't post at the time, because they were surprises, but I made 6 other aprons for the women in my family.

I was especially inspired by the designs "Mardi Gras", "Gingham Girl", "Pan-American", "Southern Belle" and a little by "Knickerbocker", by the end I was mixing and matching from the patterns and adding my own touches like appliques.

1) This one is a pretty faithful rendition of "Gingham Girl":

( All 7 behind the cut. )

December's Delineator is a little on the thin side. No articles on current events or controversial topics, just a load of fiction (6 stories, including the serial "A Feather in Her Hat" - that, maddeningly, I will not be able to finish since I don't have January 1934).

But the Home Economics sections remain interesting reading.

A special highlight, especially as an in-joke for drhaggis and veritate, comes in the Christmas gift suggestions for the home-maker. This toaster and hostess set is glamorous, strange and marvelous!


In the regular department of "Children" comes an essay on Religion and the Child. I got a bit squirmy while reading it, but I quite liked the summation:
In other words, even in our highly practical, technically perfect and high-powered civilization, there must be a place for reverence for something which is bigger than all the buildings and all the dynamos--a feeling not of inferiority but of humility, and a hope and a faith which transcend the daily grind.

( On to food and fashion behind the cut )