How to resolve AdBlock issue? Fifty years ago, on November 22, 1963 The Beatles released their second album, With the Beatles, in the UK. This unfortunate timing did not go unnoticed by the people putting on the annual Beatlemore Skidmania 13 this weekend (see 11/15 Saratoga TODAY, page 25). Other things going on (and NOT going on like cell phones, internet or debit cards):
•The Coca-Cola Company introduces its first diet drink, Tab on May 1.
•A hot new movie Cleopatra was released June 12 but Tom Jones wins Best Picture.
•On July 1, Saratoga Springs became identified as 12866 when Zip Codes made their debut.
•“Da Bears” nosed out the NY Giants 14-10 for the NFL Championship at Wrigley Field—that is not a typo. Navy’s Roger Staubach wins the Heisman Trophy, Sandy Koufax mows down the Yankees twice as the
•Dodgers sweep, 4-0 and Chateaugay won The Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes (held at Aqueduct that year, BTW) but was ‘grave yarded’ in The Travers, finishing third to Crewman.
•On TV, we saw the debuts of Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom, The Fugitive, Petticoat Junction and The Outer Limits. On April 1, long-standing soap operas General Hospital and The Doctors both began long runs, but it was As the World Turns (transmitted live at the time) which got interrupted by Walter Cronkite of CBS News with the bulletin from Dallas. ATWT actually aired another scene before Cronkite pre-empted again, this time to begin marathon coverage that kept going for three days until JFK’s funeral procession and burial on November 25.
•From the “no wonder we look back in this as a nostalgic, idyllic time department”: Three things we didn’t have: email, Facebook and texting.
- Arthur Gonick
