11,442 stories by "Trav S.D."
This one is strictly for New Yorkers, dog lovers, and vintage slapstick aficionados " preferably all three, but any combination of two will do. That Slapstick Show is returning to QED in Que…
A frequent theme of this blog is the army of performers one encountered on television variety shows in the 1970s whose presence was a little inexplicable. Invariably, when you look into them…
Note! This is a different fellow from radio, television, and film actor John Larkin (1912-1965), who was associated with Perry Mason and The Edge of Night. That's a larkin for another sunris…
Today's new Travalanche posts for November 25, 2025 are about Evacuation Day, three new screen projects with a Rhode Island connection, and stage and screen actor John Larkin. Earlier Traval…
Your correspondent is never more provincial than when attention is paid to his tiny home state. It's reached the point that not only is there an entire Rhode Island section on Travalanche, b…
Happy Evacuation Day! You may be surprised to learn that its has nothing to do with promoting colon health. November 25, 1783 was the day that the British finally departed from New York City…
Today's new Travalanche post for November 24, 2025 is about that unlikely television star William F. Buckley, who was born 100 years ago today. Earlier Travalanche posts for November 24 (in …
Author, editor, and television presenter William F. Buckley (1925-2008) was born 100 years ago today. Having now done posts on Gore Vidal, Norman Mailer, James Baldwin, and Truman Capote, of…
This concludes our multi-part series on my 60th birthday road trip to visit dead relatives. As you see from this photo, only one of them rose up to greet us. Below is an organized re-cap of …
Today's new Travalanche posts for November 23, 2025 are David Rappaport (Time Bandits), the final installment of my Southern travel series, and a recap of the entire series. Earlier Travalan…
The few stalwarts still reading this series on my sexagenarian southern sojourn will be relieved to know that we're sewing the whole thing up today. Just a few straggling memories of our las…
Like most Americans, I'll wager, I first encountered little person/ actor David Rappaport (1951-1990) in his role as Randall in Terry Gilliam's Time Bandits (1981). As leader of the group of…
Today's new Travalanche posts for November 22, 2025 are a review of Ken Burns' The American Revolution and (in a related post) a visit to the site of The Battle of Kings Mountain. Earlier Tr…
As promised in my earlier post, a few thoughts on The American Revolution docu-series by Ken Burns and his collaborators Sarah Botstein and David Schmidt. On the whole I would say the untram…
The Battle of Kings Mountain (1780), South Carolina, looms large in my family history, as several of my ancestors, relations, and their neighbors were among the so-called Overmountain Men wh…
Today's new Travalanche posts for November 21, 2025 are plugs for Universoul Circus at Coney Island, Paragon Ragtime in Oak Ridge, and an account to my recent trip to Asheville. Earlier Trav…
If ye don't know who Jimmie Rodgers is, God help us all. . As you are an astute and careful reader, you know that this post on my recent stop in Asheville is part 11 in a series of 14, with …
Having just been in Knoxville a few days ago, the news that my friends of the Paragon Ragtime Orchestra were to be playing Oak Ridge, about a half hour outside that city, couldn't do otherwi…
Heads up, New Yorkers! This is just to let you know that the Universoul Circus has pitched its tent at Coney Island and will be playing there through the rest of the month! I love it when ci…
Today's new Travalanche posts for November 20, 2025 are about Norman Greenbaum (singer of "Spirit in the Sky"), and the Eastern Band of Cherokee. Also it's World Children's Day: you may want…
Son Cashel gets very high marks indeed for the next stop on our travel itinerary, the Eastern Band of Cherokee's Qualla Boundary, which was definitely on my Bucket List, though I hadn't thou…
November 20 is the birthday of that great purveyor of Americana…Norman Greenbaum (b. 1942). I wish I'd remembered his earlier work in time to include him in the radio show I did with Will …
Today's new Travalanche posts for November 19, 2025 are about Death By Lightning (the new show about the assassination of James Garfield), character actor George Barbier, Great Smoky Mountai…
This entry in our ongoing series will perhaps more like a family vacation slideshow than any of us would like, but I will try to avoid boring you as much as possible. I have culled ten times…
By a wonderful confluence of circumstances, we find ourself at the birthday of photographer and educator W.S. Lively (William Spence Lively, Sr. 1855-1944) in the wake of just having visited…
