Our Gang, also known as The Little Rascals, was a long-lived series of comedy short films about a troupe of poor neighborhood children and the adventures they had together. Created by comedy producer Hal Roach, Our Gang was produced at the Roach studio starting in 1922 as a silent short subject series. Roach changed distributors from Pathé to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1927, went to sound in 1929, and continued production until 1938, when he sold the series to MGM, which continued producing the comedies until 1944. A total of 220 shorts and one feature film, General Spanky, were eventually produced, featuring over forty-one child actors. The series, one of the best-known and most successful in cinema history, is noted for its showcase of natural, convincing child talent, in contrast to a number of previous, contemporary, and future child actors.
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_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1128: Alfonso I of Portugal fought the Battle of São Mamede, the first step toward Portuguese independence. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_S%E3o_Mamede)
1314: Scotland regained independence as forces led by Robert the Bruce defeated Edward II of England in the Battle of Bannockburn. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Bannockburn)
1441: Eton College in Berkshire, England, was founded by King Henry VI to provide free education to poor students who would then go on to King's College, Cambridge. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eton_College)
1535: The Anabaptist state of Münster was conquered and subsequently disbanded. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%FCnster_Rebellion)
1597: The first Dutch voyage to the East Indies reached Bantam on Java. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Java_%28island%29)
1947: First known sighting of UFOs: Kenneth Arnold saw nine luminous disks in the form of saucers flying above the U.S. state of Washington. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/unidentified_flying_object)
_____________________ Wikiquote of the day:
Conservative, n. A statesman enamored of existing evils, as opposed to a Liberal, who wants to replace them with new ones. -- Ambrose Bierce (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ambrose_Bierce)