Happy Birthday Peter Sellers!

“If you ask me to play myself, I will not know what to do. I do not know who or what I am.”

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Picture Legend

1. Peter Sellers
2. Southsea Beach
3. Row of wind-pruned Huntingdon Elms, Southsea Common
4. Peter’s birthplace on Castle Road, Southsea
5. Kings Theatre in Southsea, where Peter made his first stage appearance
6. Young Peter
7. Alexandra Palace
8. Artist portrayal of Shub-Niggurath
9. St. Aloysius College
10. Drummer
11. Waldini
12. Geoffrey Rush and Charlize Theron in 2004‘s “The Life and Death of Peter Sellers”
13. Peter (top), Spike Milligan (left) and Harry Secombe (right), three of the cast of the “The Goon Show”

   This morning it is my great pleasure and honor to give a Joyce’s Take birthday shout out to one of the greatest comedic actors who ever lived, Peter Sellers!

   Mr. Sellers would have been 91 years old today. Unfortunately he passed away in London just after midnight (12:26am - British Summer Time), after being in a coma for more than 30 hours,  on July 24th, 1980, at the age of 54.

   Peter was born as Richard Henry Sellers at a very early age in 1925, in Southsea, a suburb of Portsmouth, at the southern end of Portsea Island, Hampshire, England (50° 47′ 6″ N, 1° 4′ 12″ W).

    Southsea is located to the south of Portsmouth city center and to the east of Old Portsmouth. It originally developed as a Victorian seaside resort in the 19th century and grew into a dense residential suburb and large distinct commercial and entertainment area, separate from Portsmouth city center itself.

   Southsea Common is a large expanse of mown grassland parallel to the shore from Clarence Pier to Southsea Castle.

   The Common is home to a remarkable collection of mature elm trees, believed to be the oldest and largest surviving in Hampshire, which have escaped Dutch elm disease owing to their isolation. The majority of the larger trees are Huntingdon Elms planted in the 1920s, but nearer the entrance to the Skate Park there is a fine example of a hybrid of the Siberian Elm Ulmus pumila. Huntingdon Elms once lined the Ladies' Mile—an avenue through the center of the Common—but many were lost in the Great Storm of 1987 and replaced by the Dutch hybrid elm cultivar 'Lobel'.

   Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, best known for his Sherlock Holmes stories, once lived in Southsea, and played soccer there, what the English humorously call football, as a goalkeeper for the  Portsmouth Association Football Club, an amateur, under the pseudonym A. C. Smith.

   Rudyard Kipling, the author of “The Jungle Book,” and “Kim,” lived in Southsea when he was six to twelve years old.

   The writer H.G. Wells, best known for his works in science fiction, like “The Time Machine,” “The Island of Doctor Moreau,” and “The War of the Worlds,” also lived in Southsea.

   So a lot of good writers lived in Southsea. Many others who were or are not writers have lived there as well.

   Although born Richard Henry Sellers, his parents, Yorkshire-born William "Bill" Sellers (1900–62) and Agnes Doreen "Peg" (née Marks, 1892–1967), called him Peter, in remembrance of his older brother who was stillborn. Peter remained an only child.

   He grew up in an entertainment family. He made his first appearance on stage when he was two weeks old at the Kings Theatre in Southsea. The audience sang "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow," to him, which made him cry, then he was shot out of a cannon.

   Ha, ha, ha. Just joking. It was actually a catapult.   

   The family was always on the move, touring as entertainment people often do, which affected Peter in a negative manner.

   He was much closer to Peg, than his dad, who rarely encouraged his son in his efforts to carry on the family business, just the opposite of his mom.

   Some of his friends observed that he may have been a little too close to his mother, allowing her to dominate his life. 

   Well what can you do? Moms are moms.

   When he was ten the family moved to North London and settled in Muswell Hill (a suburb of north London, in the London Borough of Haringey and the London Borough of Barnet. It is one of the more expensive suburbs in London situated near to Highgate, Hampstead, East Finchley and Crouch End, (where the divide between our world and an alien, demonic world is somehow lesser. Crouch End is the home of Shub-Niggurath, who is often associated with the phrase “The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young.” There are still strange occurrences in Crouch End, and that, very occasionally, people are known to "...lose their way. Some lose their way forever."). Muswell Hill is the home of the Alexandra Palace (designed to serve as a public center of recreation, education and entertainment).

   Although Bill Sellers was Protestant and Peg was Jewish, Peter attended the North London Roman Catholic School St. Aloysius College in Highgate, two miles south of Muswell Hill. The college was and is run by the Brothers of Mercy of Our Lady of Perpetual Help (The institute was founded in 1839 by Canon J. B. Cornelius Scheppers (1802 - 1877) for the instruction and care of prisoners and of the sick. Cardinal Manning invited them to London in 1855, where they have undertaken the care of the prisoners in Catholic reformatories and the education of the children of the poor).       

   “I was never a good scholar, Perhaps I never settled down to it,” Peter recalled in 1962. “Perhaps that’s what was wrong with my education. But I didn’t dislike it at  St. Aloysius. I’ve sometimes been back to see the people there...”

   While at school Peter began to develop his improvisational skills. He and his closest friend at the time, Bryan Connon (April 5 1927 to September 4 2007. Bryan became a successful writer and biographer), both enjoyed listening to early radio comedy shows. Connon remembers that "Peter got endless pleasure imitating the people in “Monday Night at Eight.” He had a gift for improvising dialogue. Sketches, too. I'd be the 'straight man', the 'feed', ... I'd cue Peter and he'd do all the radio personalities and chuck in a few voices of his own invention as well."

   When World War II began in 1939, the students at St. Aloysius were evacuated to Cambridgeshire, 61.5 miles from Highgate, and famous for it’s bomb shelters.

   Peg would not allow Peter to go, so his formal education ended when he was fourteen.

   The next year the family moved to the seaside resort town of Ilfracombe, 229.9 miles west of Highgate, where Peg’s brother lived, and who managed a local theatre. 

   That’s where Peter got his first job when he was fifteen. He started as a caretaker (janitor) for ten shillings a week (maybe about £70.78 in 2016, which is about $93.45 U.S), and was steadily promoted, becoming a box office clerk, usher, assistant stage manager and lighting operator.

   Working backstage gave him a chance to study actors such as Paul Scofield and Mary Clare.

   He became close friends with another boy his age, Derek Altman, and together they launched Peter’s first stage act under the name "Altman and Sellers," which pretty much consisted of playing ukuleles, singing, and telling jokes (they also began their own detective agency (Selman Investigations Inc. as they were fans of the novelist Dashiell Hammett, creator of the fictional detectives Sam Spade and the Thin Man).

    “We’re Altman and Sellers

      The younger generation
      We always sing in the best syncopation
      And we hope we make a big sensation
      With you - ooh - ooh!”

      It was during this time that Peter learned to play the drums (he had no patience for the piano) and was so enthusiastic about them he thought he might do it professionally.

   “It was the drums I was really keen on in the early days. I suddenly went mad about the drums. I spent months learning from a professional drummer. And I was pretty good.”

   Good enough to appear twice in Waldini’s (Waldini, Wally Bishop, was the founder of Waldini‘s Gypsy band, and many others) “Symphony in Colour,” in August of 1941. 

   Peter joined the Royal Air Force in September of 1943. He was probably drafted as Peg tried unsuccessfully to get him deferred on medical grounds.

   He wanted to become a pilot but was rejected for poor eyesight.

   He got bored with ground duties and auditioned for Squadron Leader Ralph Reader's RAF Gang Show entertainment troupe. Reader accepted him and Peter toured the UK before the troupe was transferred to India. He also served in Germany and France after the war.

  Back home Peter continued his career in entertainment, with limited success. In 1948 he wrote to the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), and was given an audition. As a result, he made his television debut on March 18th, 1948 in “New To You.”

   His act was well received and he was invited back the next week.

   However, Peter’s personality was such that he was determined to make it in the entertainment business and he felt his career was advancing too slowly.

   Accordingly he called BBC radio producer Roy Speer, pretending to be Kenneth Horne, star of the radio show “Much-Binding-in-the-Marsh.”

   When Speers discovered it was Peter who telephoned him Speer called Peter a "cheeky young sod" for his efforts, which is pretty strong language in Britain, but that prank got him an audition (which is depicted by the wonderful Australian actor, Geoffrey Rush, in 2004's “The Life and Death of Peter Sellers,” with the lovely and talented Charlize Theron). This led to a brief appearance on “ShowTime," on July 1st, 1948, which led to more work on “Ray's a Laugh,” with comedian Ted Ray.

   In October of 1948, Peter was a regular radio performer, appearing on the “Starlight Hour,” “The Gang Show,” “Henry Hall's Guest Night,” and “It's Fine To Be Young.”

   By the end of  the year the BBC Third Programme (a national radio service produced and broadcast by the BBC between 1946 and 1970) began to broadcast the comedy series “Third Division,” which starred, among others, Harry Secombe, Michael Bentine and Peter. One evening, Peter and Michael visited the Hackney Empire (a theatre on Mare Street, in the London Borough of Hackney, built in 1901 as a music hall), where Harry was performing, and Michael introduced Peter to Spike Milligan.

   And thus these four founded and constituted the cast of “Crazy People,” which appeared on British airwaves for the first time on May 28th, 1951.

   Subsequent seasons had the title changed to “The Goon Show.”

To be continued

Part 2

Labor Day 4

Labor Day. This weekend, as you enjoy a day off and the remaining days of summer with friends and family, it’s important to remember what Labor Day is actually celebrating—the incredible progress of workers’ rights. When unions are strong, they are able to boost all workers' wages—regardless of whether they are members of a union, reduce poverty and strengthen the middle class. But the fight for workers’ rights isn’t over. Workers across the country will be on strike this Labor Day to demand $15 and a union. Unions are under attack by corporate interests, and many workers still aren’t paid fair wages. So this Labor Day, let’s honor those who have fought so hard for weekends, fair compensation, paid leave, and more by standing up for those who still need more protections in their jobs.

Last Thursday a Texas federal judge struck down an Obama-era rule that would have provided overtime protections for over 4 million workers throughout the country. Ben Olinsky, the vice president of policy and strategy at the Center for American Progress, noted that this decision “is a huge loss…[and] Secretary  of Labor Alexander Acosta and President Donald Trump should stand up for workers by appealing this ruling immediately.”

 “The good news this Labor Day: Jobs are returning. The bad news this Labor Day: Most of them pay lousy wages and low if non-existent benefits.” -Robert Reich, Former Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton

Labor Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the first Monday in September, that celebrates the economic and social contributions of workers. It was first nationally recognized in 1894 to placate unionists following the Pullman Strike. With the decline in union membership, the holiday is generally viewed as a time for barbecues and the end of summer vacations. -Wikipedia

Labor unions are legally recognized as representatives of workers in many industries in the United States. Their activity today centers on collective bargaining over wages, benefits, and working conditions for their membership, and on representing their members in disputes with management over violations of contract provisions. Larger unions also typically engage in lobbying activities and electioneering at the state and federal level. -Wikipedia


 
   You see that first picture above? The one that says “Labor Day,” with the four flags. It looks pretty patriotic doesn’t it?
   You can even find pictures of naked ladies with the American flag strategically draped over them denoting that Labor Day is a very American and an important holiday, although one has to wonder exactly what kind of labor they’re advocating for.
   Most politicians wouldn’t mind seeing labor unions go the way of the dinosaurs, including those that live in the White House. Republicans traditionally resent labor unions and do what they can to curb their influence. The right wing media villainize unions and their members as parasites upon society, and unfortunately those who listen to their dribble, tend to carry on and live with that idea as if it were their own, and resent those being represented by labor, those who might make a decent living and enjoy pensions and health benefits, and think of them as overpaid and unnecessary burdens placed upon the rest of the country.
   Unless of course they happen to be members of unions themselves.
   As did my own sister who worked in the gaming industry in Laughlin, Nevada.
   For one reason or another she had a negative view of unions and refused to take part in efforts to unionize the worker in casinos.
   I still don’t know how she feels about unions in general. I do know she was summarily fired from her long standing job as a black jack dealer when she developed severe back pain and wasn’able to stand for lengthy periods of time. She was let go without a pension or benefits of any kind. The casino just used her up and discarded her when she couldn’t meet their expectations, something that a union definitely could have helped her with.
   In any case, regardless of how unions are perceived, “Study after study has come to the same conclusion: When workers come together in unions, they can help make things better for themselves, and indeed most Americans. Joining together enables workers to negotiate for higher wages and benefits, and when unions are strong, these benefits can spill over into other nonunion workplaces. Unions of working people also help ensure that government works for everyone—not just those at the top—by encouraging people of modest means to vote and by providing a crucial counterbalance to wealthy interest groups. Their ability to improve conditions in the workplace and in our democracy means that unions play a critical role in building the middle class.” -David Madland and Alex Rowell of The Center for American Progress action Fund.
   Democrats are traditionally seen as pro-union, pro-labor, and have indeed benefited by receiving major campaign contributions from unions as a result, which is another reason the Republicans hate them... unions that is (they hate Democrats too, as seen by their childish refusal to call the Democratic Party by their real name... the Democratic Party. Instead they call it the Democrat Party, a pejorative reference, one that sadly has infected many democrats and media anchor people, who should know better).
   I was a member of a union at one time. The Communication Workers of America,  representing about 550,000 members in both the private and public sectors. I didn’t have a whole lot of exposure to it, and my pay was hourly and not expansive, and I don’t recall how much the dues were, but it did help me by making it difficult for AT&T (I was working as a long distance operator at the time) management to fire me when I was absent from work for extended periods of time due to illness. And my health benefits, which the union promoted and protected, allowed me to enjoy hospital care when I needed it, medical attention I wouldn’t have otherwise been able to afford.
   Being in that union was also psychologically beneficial, knowing I had a whole bunch of people whose only job it was to look out for my interests. I had worked too many jobs where that wasn’t the case, and the boss could fire me at their whim, for any reason, or none at all.
   Unions tend to even out the power structure of the working place.
   Lately, as the second and third paragraph above suggests, unions have been in decline in this country. “With the decline in union membership, the holiday is generally viewed as a time for barbecues and the end of summer vacations.” Wow, what a sad declaration. A day set aside to celebrate the average worker's contribution to the country to one that designates it’s a good time to cook some hot dogs and hamburgers on the grill, or maybe get that vacation to Ogallala, Nebraska in before autumn comes and the falling leaves begin to blanket the roads.
   Labor unions and the laborers that make them up originally proposed the idea of a national holiday devoted to labor. A machinist, Matthew Maguire, while serving as secretary of the CLU (Central Labor Union) of New York, proposed the idea in 1882, way before my time... or even yours (others say it was Peter J. McGuire of the AFL (American Federation of Labor) that same year, after attending a “labor festival” in Canada. I have no idea who was actually first, so we’ll let the two duke it out amongst themselves). However, it was the states who took up the idea way before the federal government got on board.  The first state bill was introduced into the New York legislature, but the first to become law was passed by Oregon on February 21st, 1887. During the next year four more, the states Colorado, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York created a Labor Day holiday by legislative enactment. By 1894, 30 states had adopted the holiday.
   And that was the year that Congress passed legislation that made Labor Day a national holiday, 1894, and the President at the time, one Grover Cleveland (no relation to the city. He is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms (1885–1889 and 1893–1897)), who was definitely pro-business. A Democrat, as a matter of fact a Bourbon Democrat (a Democrat who only drinks whiskey made of a grain mix of at least 51% corn), who opposed high tariffs, Free Silver, inflation, imperialism and subsidies to business, farmers or veterans. Today’s Republicans would have loved him (although when a “Railroad Bubble” burst at the beginning of his second term, causing a national depression he was unable to alleviate, allowing the Republicans to dominate the government which ironically ushered in the “Progressive Era,” a period of social activism and political reform that flourished until the 1920s).
   Grover signed Labor Day into law more than likely as a political sop to the existing labor organizations and unions due to his intervention in the Pullman Strike (second picture above), in which thousands of United States Marshals and some 12,000 United States Army troops intervened in a strike by workers of  the Pullman Palace Car Company, which made railroad cars, causing the death of 30 strikers,  and wounding 57 others. He signed it into law just six days after the strike ended.
   In 1987 President Cleveland opted to celebrate the new national holiday in September, as the unions favored, rather than on May 1st, which was synonymous with, or linked to, International Workers' Day, which celebrated labor forces internationally, but was also linked with the nascent Communist, Syndicalist and Anarchist movements of the day.
   For a time unions flourished and fought for the rights of all workers, whether unionized or not.
   In 1938, in the midst of the “Great Depression,” Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Fair Labor Standards Act into law, which introduced a maximum 44-hour seven-day workweek (the United States Adamson Act in 1916 established an eight-hour day, with additional pay for overtime, for railroad workers. This was the first federal law that regulated the hours of workers in private companies. The United States Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Act in Wilson v. New, 243 U.S. 332 (1917). The Fair Labor Standards Act, as enacted applied to industries whose combined employment represented about twenty percent of the U.S. labor force. In those industries, it set the maximum workweek at 40 hours, but provided that employees working beyond 40 hours a week would receive additional overtime bonus salaries), established a national minimum wage, guaranteed "time-and-a-half" for overtime in certain jobs, and prohibited most employment of minors in "oppressive child labor,"  all in the face of considerable opposition and criticism from large business interests.
   Despite projections to the contrary, the Sun still shined, the world still existed, and the country somehow survived.
   This is one reason today’s right wing, and modern conservatives hate FDR and everything he stood for (Rush Limbaugh: "Roosevelt is dead. His policies may live on, but we're in the process of doing something about that as well."), and wish to repeal all of his legislative efforts. (in May of 2013 and 2017, House Republicans passed a bill that would end the 40-hour work week (it would be nice if we could get Congress to actually work 40 hours a week), dismantling an important component of the Federal Labor Standards Act, which made into law would hurt middle-class families across the country. Sponsored by Rep. Martha Roby (AL), in 2013, and Rep. Martha Roby (R-AL) in 2017, the dubiously-titled “Working Families Flexibility Act” (H.R. 1180) would remove the requirement that employers pay a cash premium for overtime work and instead allow them to offer employees compensatory time off. The effect would be a Federal Labor Standards Act that is undermined of its only incentive against excessive hours and a cheaper way for employers to demand mandatory overtime. Eileen Appelbaum, a senior economist with the Center for Economic Policy and Research, says the bill’s major effect would be to hurt workers, “likely increasing overtime hours for those who don’t want them and cutting pay for those who do.” The Bill was passed in the House May 2nd, 2017, and sent to the Senate in April where it was sent to committee. Repealing Child Labor Laws are also on the Republican agenda).
   There are many and varied arguments against unions and unionization, many of which are born from economic theory from the likes of the economist Milton Friedman, which the Republican Party has adopted in it’s efforts to stymie the advancement of the labor force and higher wages. Some of these arguments are valid, as in the case of the corruption in unions and their leadership (the case of Jimmy Hoffa comes to mind) and the mistaken assumption that higher wages, and by extension, a living minimum wage, are harmful to the overall economy in that they will discourage job formation.
   Well there is corruption in unions. There’s corruption everywhere! The United States enjoys a 2015 Corruption Perception Index of 76 (0 being the least corrupt and 100 being the most), with only Denmark, Finland, Sweden, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, Singapore, Canada, Germany, Luxembourg, the United Kingdom, Australia, Iceland, Belgium, and Austria being less corrupt.
   The passage of Citizens United v. FEC insured that massive amounts of money could and would be injected into the American election process. Who needs Russian hacking when politicians can just be bought and paid for? And if Citizens United were not bad enough, members of Congress spend at least half of their time soliciting funds for their next election. It would seem that the interests of congress is  not to do the people’s business, but to stay in power. So to the question, is our Congress corrupt, I would have to refer to Joyce’s Take’s own exhaustive investigation.     
   Corruption is a problem everywhere, and should be dealt with accordingly any time it is detected... unions don’t need to be singled out.
   As to higher wages being responsible for poor employment, that is a right wing myth. As a matter of fact just the opposite is true.
   Some people, like Mike Patton writing for Forbes Magazine, imply that an “increase in annual pay would be approximately $40.8 billion. If we exclude all taxes and assume 100% of the increase was spent on various goods and services, it would equate to 0.23% of total U.S. GDP ($40.8 billion / $18 trillion). Here's my point. This increase, even if completely spent (which is doubtful), would not be very significant. Therefore, in my view, the economic benefit "argument" is a red herring.”
   Assuming his numbers are correct I take issue with his conclusion. A $40.8 billion injection into our economy is a good thing and not to be belittled (and a higher wage for workers has the added, and not insignificant affect of bettering the lives of American workers, reducing poverty and homelessness, etc.).
   Unions fight for this, and for doing so directly interfere with the interests of most politicians, which is to shovel all available funds to powerful people and business interests, therefore insuring their own ability to stay in power. 
   Please, enjoy this almost hypocritical celebration of labor on this day. Grill some hot dogs, hamburgers, and maybe some ears of corn. Take a vacation.
   Celebrate the fact that Labor Day Weekend is the top holiday for those who legally sell marijuana!
   I’ll let the independent Senator from Vermont, and former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders have the last word:

   We must rebuild the American labor movement and make it easier, not harder, for workers to join unions. Forty years ago, more than a quarter of all workers belonged to a union. Today, that number has gone down to just 11 percent and in the private sector it is now less than 7 percent as Republican governors across the country have signed anti-union legislation into law, drastically cutting labor membership in this country.
   It is not a coincidence that the decline of the American middle class virtually mirrors the rapid decline in union membership. As workers lose their seat at the negotiating table, the share of national income going to middle class workers has gone down, while the percentage of income going to the very wealthy has gone up.
   The benefits of joining a union are clear. Union workers earn 27 percent more, on average, than non-union workers. Over 76 percent of union workers have guaranteed defined benefit pension plans, while only 16 percent of non-union workers do. More than 82 percent of workers in unions have paid sick leave, compared to just 62 percent of non-union workers.
   In order to revitalize American democracy we must overturn Citizens United, move to public funding of elections and end voter suppression.
   We must demand that the wealthy and large corporations begin paying their fair share of taxes.
   We must break-up the large Wall Street financial banks and make sure that no institution in America is too big to fail.
   We must raise the minimum wage to a living wage, $15 an hour, and end the unconscionable and inequitable pay gap that currently exists between male and female workers.
   We must re-write our disastrous trade policies and make sure that trade agreements benefit workers and not just CEOs of large corporations.
   We must rebuild our crumbling infrastructure with a $1 trillion dollar investment and create up to 15 million good-paying jobs.
   We must pass a Medicare-for-all, single-payer health care system and guarantee health care as a right, not a privilege.
   We must make public colleges and universities tuition free for working families so that everyone can get a higher education regardless of income.
   Today, on Labor Day, we must recommit ourselves to bringing all working people together in the fight for a just and humane world.