AUGUST 23 – 1979 Soviet Ballet dancer Godunov defects to America; 2016 Sheils Chastek of Bucks County, PA becomes Sesame Street’s biggest fan; 1784 Republic of Franklin declares independence from U.S.; 2017 Yankee Britton converts his 60th consecutive save
AUGUST 23
1979—Aleksandr Godunov defects to the US. So how’s that communist thing working out? Exactly. Normally I don’t talk about ballet on this show because that’s just not my thing, but this is a cool story. Plus Godunov played Karl in Die Hard. There were several ballet dancers from the Soviet Union who defected and sought asylum in the the United States, including Rudolf Nureyev, Natalia Makarova and Mikhail Baryshnikov, but Godunov was from the esteemed Bolshoi Ballet. His defection was a big slap in the face of the Soviet Union. His wife decided not to defect, and stayed behind. The two divorced.
US President Jimmy Carter and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev were okay with the fact that she wanted to stay on her own free will. This was a political statement and Godunov enjoyed a successful career in the United States bot as a dancer and a Hollywood actor. He appeared in the movies Witness in 1985, The Money Pit in 1986, Die Hard in 1988, and several others. He died from alcohol related issues in 1995.
1904 – Weed patents the tire chain. Harry Delyne Weed, one of America’s less known great inventors was issued Patent #768, 495 for his weed grip for providing traction for automobiles driving on snow, mud, and ice. As cool as that was, the way he marketed it was ingenious. He challenged magician Harry Houdini to get out of his tire-chained prison. On April 10, 1908, Weed personnel bound Houdini in six sets of tire chains and two steel rimmed automobile tires. It wasn’t easy, but Houdini managed to escape in front of am amazed audience.
Weed went on to fight in WWI, and after that came up with and airline bomb rack and machine gun synchronizing devices that were widely used in WWII. Harry Weed died in Palm Beach, FL in 1961, at the age of 89.
2016 – Sheils Chastek wins the prize for collecting the most Sesame Street toys ever.
She started in 1973 by painting her New York apartment’s kitchen yellow and collecting Big Birds. Sheila was actually a college math professor and retired recently retired to enjoy her toys. When she got the news she was the record holder, Children Television Workshop actually invited her to Sesame Street Land in Bucks County PA for a day. Apparently it’s a theme park. Sheila, her husband, children, their spouses and children all got to go. During a performance, Big Bird himself invited Shilea up on stage and congratulated her. The folks at Sesame Street gave Sheila about 50 more Sesame Street collectables, pushing her assemblage over the 1,000 limit.
Congratulations Sheila! We hope you have a very yellow day.
1784 – The Free Republic State of Franklin declares independence. This was almost America’s fourteenth colony, or state. The State of Franklin, which would later become east Tennessee, existed from 1784-1788. In fact, if you know this story, it’s probably because you’re from that area. They still have the bank of Franklin Johnson County and there’s Franklin road runs next to Tennessee State University. Franklin had ceded its western land claims between the Allegheny Mountains and the Mississippi River.
The four counties of Washington, Sullivan, Spencer, or present day Hawkins and Greene declared independence from North Carolina, but later petitioned for statehood to Congress. The petition didn’t pass, and Franklin remained an independent nation with its own government, constitution, currency, etc. etc.
It had a very weak economy and its governor, John Sevier, was considering asking the Spanish for aid. That’ would’ve been bad for the United States, and Sevier was arrested. When Cherokee, Chickamauga and Chickasaw tribes began attacking the area in 1788, it rejoined North Carolina in order to get military support.
1996 – Osama Bin Laden sends a message called “A declaration of war against the Americans occupying the land of the two holy places.”
2017 — Zach Britton converts his 60th consecutive save.
Current New York Yankee and former Oriole, Britton was drafted by Baltimore in the 3rd round in the MLB in 2006. In 2015 and 2016 he was an MLB All-Star, and led the American League with 47 saves and 63 Game Finishers. Also in 2016 he pitched 67 innings while allowing only four earned runs, giving him a 0.54 ERA; which by the by is the lowest ERA by an MLB player who pitched at least 50 innings in four seasons.