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Brass Monkey (colloquial Expression)
"Cold enough to freeze the balls off (or ''on'') a brass monkey" (also "brass monkey weather") is a colloquial expression used by some English language, English speakers to describe extremely cold weather. The reference to the Testicle, testes (as the term ''balls'' is commonly understood to mean) of the brass monkey appears to be a 20th-century variant on the expression, prefigured by a range of references to other body parts, especially the nose and tail. History During the 19th and 20th centuries, small monkeys cast from the alloy brass were very common tourist souvenirs from China and Japan. They usually, but not always, came in a set of three representing the Three Wise Monkeys carved in wood above the Nikkō Tōshō-gū, Shrine of Tōshō-gū in Nikkō, Tochigi, Nikkō, Tochigi (prefecture), Tochigi, Japan. These monkeys were often cast with all three in a single piece. In other sets they were made singly. Old brass monkeys of this type are collectors' items. Michael Quinio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herman Melville
Herman Melville (Name change, born Melvill; August 1, 1819 – September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, short story writer, and poet of the American Renaissance (literature), American Renaissance period. Among his best-known works are ''Moby-Dick'' (1851); ''Typee'' (1846), a romanticized account of his experiences in Polynesia; and ''Billy Budd, Billy Budd, Sailor'', a posthumously published novella. At the time of his death Melville was not well known to the public, but 1919, the centennial of his birth, was the starting point of a #Melville revival and Melville studies, Melville revival. ''Moby-Dick'' would eventually be considered one of the great American novels. Melville was born in New York City, the third child of a prosperous merchant whose death in 1832 left the family in dire financial straits. He took to sea in 1839 as a common sailor on the merchant ship ''St. Lawrence'' and then, in 1841, on the whaler ''Acushnet'', but he jumped ship in the Marquesas I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Field (heraldry)
In heraldry, the background of the shield is called the ''field''. The field is usually composed of one or more tinctures (colours or metals) or furs. The field may be divided or may consist of a variegated pattern. In rare modern cases, the field or a subdivision thereof is not a tincture but is shown as a scene from a landscape, or, in the case of the 329th Fighter Group of the United States Air Force, blazoned as ''the sky proper''.''Air Force Combat Units of World War II'', p.210 Landscape fields are regarded by many heralds as unheraldic and debased, as they defy the heraldic ideal of simple, boldly-coloured images, and they cannot be consistently drawn from blazon. The arms of the Inveraray and District Community Council in Scotland have as a field ''In waves of the sea''. The correct language of heraldry is very flexible and virtually any image may be blazoned in a correct manner; for example "sky proper" might be blazoned simply ''Azure'' or '' bleu celeste'', whil ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gold (color)
Gold, also called golden, is a color tone resembling the gold chemical element. The web color ''gold'' is sometimes referred to as ''golden'' to distinguish it from the color ''metallic gold''. The use of ''gold'' as a color term in traditional usage is more often applied to the color "metallic gold" (shown below). The first recorded use of ''golden'' as a color name in English was in 1300 to refer to the element gold. The word ''gold'' as a color name was first used in 1400 and in 1423 to refer to blond hair.Maerz and Paul ''A Dictionary of Color'' New York:1930 McGraw-Hill Page 195 Metallic gold, such as in paint, is often called ''goldtone'' or ''gold tone'', or '' gold ground'' when describing a solid gold background. In heraldry, the French word or is used. In model building, the color gold is different from brass. A shiny or metallic silvertone object can be painted with transparent yellow to obtain goldtone, something often done with Christmas decorations. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cunard Line
The Cunard Line ( ) is a British shipping and an international cruise line based at Carnival House at Southampton, England, operated by Carnival UK and owned by Carnival Corporation & plc. Since 2011, Cunard and its four ships have been registered in Hamilton, Bermuda. In 1839, Samuel Cunard was awarded the first British transatlantic steamship mail contract, and the next year formed the British and North American Royal Mail Steam-Packet Company in Glasgow with shipowner Sir George Burns together with Robert Napier, the famous Scottish steamship engine designer and builder, to operate the line's four pioneer paddle steamers on the Liverpool–Halifax–Boston route. For most of the next 30 years, Cunard held the Blue Riband for the fastest Atlantic voyage. However, in the 1870s Cunard fell behind its rivals, the White Star Line and the Inman Line. To meet this competition, in 1879 the firm was reorganised as the Cunard Steamship Company Ltd, to raise capital. In 19 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
YouTube
YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in San Bruno, California, it is the second-most-visited website in the world, after Google Search. In January 2024, YouTube had more than 2.7billion monthly active users, who collectively watched more than one billion hours of videos every day. , videos were being uploaded to the platform at a rate of more than 500 hours of content per minute, and , there were approximately 14.8billion videos in total. On November 13, 2006, YouTube was purchased by Google for $1.65 billion (equivalent to $ billion in ). Google expanded YouTube's business model of generating revenue from advertisements alone, to offering paid content such as movies and exclusive content produced by and for YouTube. It also offers YouTube Premium, a paid subs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harry Stewart
Harry Stewart (October 21, 1908 – May 20, 1956), born Harry Skarbo, was an entertainer, singer, comedian, and songwriter. He was best known for his portrayal of Yogi Yorgesson, a comically exaggerated Swedish American.Harry Stewart biography ''wisc.edu''. Retrieved: October 12, 2021. Biography Harry Edward Skarbo was born in , to Hans H. Skarbo (1878–1941) an immigrant from , and Elsie (Gilbertson) Skarbo (1882– 1911) who was the daughter of Norwegian immigrants. After the death of his mother, he was adopted by the Stewart family. Grow ...[...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herbert Lom
Herbert Charles Angelo Kuchačevič ze Schluderpacheru (11 September 1917 – 27 September 2012), known professionally as Herbert Lom (), was a Czech-British actor with a career spanning over 60 years. His cool demeanour and precise, elegant elocution saw him cast as criminals or suave villains in his younger years, and professional men and nobles as he aged. Highly versatile, he also played the beleaguered Chief Inspector Charles Dreyfus in seven '' Pink Panther'' films. Lom’s other notable films included '' The Ladykillers'' (1955), ''War and Peace'' (1956), ''Spartacus'' (1960), ''El Cid'' (1961), ''Mysterious Island'' (also 1961), ''The Phantom of the Opera'' (1962), and ''The Dead Zone'' (1983). He also originated the role of the King of Siam in the original West End production of The King and I, and starred on the 1960s television drama '' The Human Jungle''. Early life and education Lom was born in Prague to Karl Kuchačevič ze Schluderpacheru and Olga Got ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carole Landis
Carole Landis (born Frances Lillian Mary Ridste; January 1, 1919 – July 5, 1948) was an American actress and singer. She worked as a contract player for Twentieth Century-Fox in the 1940s. Her breakout role was as the female lead in the 1940 film '' One Million B.C.'' from United Artists. She was known as "The Ping Girl" and "The Chest" because of her curvy figure. Early life Landis was born on January 1, 1919, in Fairchild, Wisconsin, the youngest of five children of Clara (née Sentek), a Polish farmer's daughter, and Norwegian-American Alfred Ridste, a drifting railroad mechanic who abandoned the family after Landis's birth. According to Landis's biographer E. J. Fleming, circumstantial evidence supports that Landis was likely the biological child of her mother's second husband, Charles Fenner. Fenner left Landis's mother in April 1921 and remarried a few months later. In 1923, Landis's family moved to San Bernardino, California, where her mother worked menial jobs to s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carroll Levis
Carroll Richard Levis (March 15, 1910 – October 17, 1968) was a Canadian talent scout, impresario and radio and television broadcaster, mainly working in Britain. Biography Born in Toronto and brought up in Vancouver, the son of a murdered policeman, he grew up wanting to be an actor, but held various jobs in movie theatres and as a deckhand before doing some work as a comedian and stage hypnotist. He began broadcasting as an announcer with CKWX in Vancouver. When working in Alberta, on one occasion he had time to fill in during a live broadcast and persuaded a boy in the audience to sing a song. Following a good listener reaction, he started a local radio talent show, ''Saturday Night Club of the Air'', and then a similar programme in Montreal. In 1935, he decided to move to England. He met radio producer Eric Maschwitz, and they developed a tour of British cities to find new talent. His touring stage shows attracted thousands of applicants from potential performers, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brass Monkey (film)
''Brass Monkey'' (also known as ''The Lucky Mascot'') is a 1948 British comedy thriller film with musical asides, directed by Thornton Freeland. It stars Carroll Levis, a radio variety show host and talent scout (known as "Britain's favourite Canadian") and American actress Carole Landis in her last film. It features an early appearance by comic actor Terry-Thomas, playing himself. Though made in 1948, ''Brass Monkey'' was not released in the US until 1951. Plot Popular radio presenter Carroll Levis, and Kay Sheldon find themselves entangled in a web of smuggling and murder. When a priceless "brass monkey" is stolen from a Japanese temple and smuggled into England, Levis encounters the eccentric Mr. Ryder-Harris, a Buddhist art connoisseur who's chasing the artefact, and will apparently stop at nothing to get it. The monkey is missing and suspicious murders are being committed in the hunt for its retrieval. With the help of the ''Discoveries'' radio talent, Levis attempts to av ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1864 - 1946)
Events January * January 13 – American songwriter Stephen Foster ("Oh! Susanna", "Old Folks at Home") dies aged 37 in New York City, leaving a scrap of paper reading "Dear friends and gentle hearts". His parlor song " Beautiful Dreamer" is published in March. * January 16 – Denmark rejects an Austrian-Prussian ultimatum to repeal the Danish Constitution, which says that Schleswig-Holstein is part of Denmark. * January 21 – New Zealand Wars: The Tauranga campaign begins. February * February – John Wisden publishes '' The Cricketer's Almanack for the year 1864'' in England; it will go on to become the major annual cricket reference publication. * February 1 – Danish-Prussian War (Second Schleswig War): 57,000 Austrian and Prussian troops cross the Eider River into Denmark. * February 15 – Heineken Brewery is founded in the Netherlands. *American Civil War: ** February 17 – The tiny Confederate hand-propelled submarine '' H. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
