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(Today marks the 67th anniversary of the announcement on August 14 (August 15 Tokyo time) 1945 by Emperor Hirohito of the acceptance of the Potsdam terms for unconditional surrender (with the condition that he could remain as a figurehead emperor). I find the period from Hirohito's announcement until the formal surrender aboard the U.S.S. Missouri on September 2 to be a fascinating period chock full of things you probably don't know. Although my last blog entry was about the Guadalcanal campaign, the next edition will be about a completely different topic than WWII.) 1. Although the formal surrender of...

Most stars will have been eagerly preparing their Oscars outfits over the last few weeks in anticipation of what is one of the biggest events on the showbiz calendar. And there's no doubt that a select few celebrities will be debuting the latest 'work' they have had done, as well as their glamorous gowns, Jane Fonda being a perfect case in point. Following her recent admission that she'd had cosmetic surgery, the 72-year-old actress was pictured leaving a star-studded pre-Oscars mansion party in Beverly Hills ahead of tonight's event. With a darker, cropped hairdo to complete her look, Miss Fonda...

The comedy icon made pie-in-the-face gag a pop-culture phenomenon: It was a simple gag, but one that made Soupy Sales a household name: a pie in the face, or 20,000 pies, to be exact. That slapstick comedic trick, along with a warehouse of goofy faces and wacky characters helped elevate Sales (born Milton Supman) to one of the country's most beloved comedians in the late 1950s. Sales died on Thursday at the age of 83 at a hospital in the Bronx, after several years of declining health... With his loose-limbed physicality and malleable face, Sales honed his craft on children's...

Soupy Sales died at age 83 yesterday. He hosted an afternoon kiddie show that reached its height of popularity in the mid-1960s. He was totally unlike other kids-show hosts of that, or any other, era. He wasn’t soft-spoken, like Mr. Rogers; he wasn’t grandfatherly, like Captain Kangaroo; he didn’t want to teach you anything, like Mr. Wizard. What Soupy was was a unique combination of silly and hip. He mixed slapstick with self-conscious irony. He was forever getting a pie thrown in his face. He talked to puppets, especially two — White Fang and Black Tooth — that were really...

The comedy icon made pie-in-the-face gag a pop-culture phenomenon: It was a simple gag, but one that made Soupy Sales a household name: a pie in the face, or 20,000 pies, to be exact. That slapstick comedic trick, along with a warehouse of goofy faces and wacky characters helped elevate Sales (born Milton Supman) to one of the country's most beloved comedians in the late 1950s. Sales died on Thursday at the age of 83 at a hospital in the Bronx, after several years of declining health... With his loose-limbed physicality and malleable face, Sales honed his craft on children's...

DETROIT – Soupy Sales, the rubber-faced comedian whose anything-for-a-chuckle career was built on 20,000 pies to the face and 5,000 live TV appearances across a half-century of laughs, has died. He was 83. Sales died at Thursday night at Calvary Hospice in the Bronx, New York, said his former manager and longtime friend, Dave Usher. Sales had many health problems and entered the hospice last week, Usher said. At the peak of his fame in the 1950s and '60s, Sales was one of the best-known faces in the nation, Usher said.

Comedian Soupy Sales, who once said a pie in the eye was worth two in the sky, saw his proclivity for pie-tossing pay off with a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame. “I appreciate this from the bottom of my heart and I appreciate you all coming here in the rain,” Sales, who was seated in a wheelchair, said Friday. The rain forced the ceremony to be held inside the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, with Hollywood's honorary mayor, Johnny Grant, setting up the 79-year-old comic's classic schtick. “Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr. had pies thrown in their face by Soupy Sales...