September 6-14, 1901: The Assassination and Death of William McKinley, the Rise of Theodore Roosevelt

The last known photograph of the 25th President of the United States,

William McKinley, walking into the Temple of Music, September 6, 1901.

September 6, 1901: President William McKinley is shot in Buffalo, New York. He dies 8 days later, at the age of 58.

A native of Canton, Ohio, McKinley had served in the Union Army in the American Civil War, and had served his home State in Congress and as Governor. Nominated for President by the Republican Party in 1896, with a depression going on, he ran on what his campaign chairman, Ohio political fixer Mark Hanna, called "the full dinner pail."

His Democratic opponent was Congressman William Jennings Bryan of Nebraska, who said the answer to America's economic woes was the free coinage of silver, as opposed to gold. This split the party, and painted Bryan and the Democrats as people playing games with the economy.

The election was on November 3, and many bosses told their employees, "If Bryan wins on Tuesday, don't come to work on Wednesday." It was a threat that workers could be fired for voting for Bryan, but it was also a scare tactic: If Bryan wins, this company won't survive. McKinley won in a landslide, as Bryan's "Populist" message simply didn't reach enough Americans.

McKinley's reforms did end the depression that had begun with a tariff bill in 1890 -- which he, as Congressman, had written -- but really got going with the stock market's Panic of 1893. (They didn't call them "crashes" until 1929.) He also launched the Spanish-American War of 1898, which further enriched the already-rich.

Still, there was lots of discontent. Bryan thought his Populist message would work in 1900, paired with anger over the imperialism of 1898. It didn't: McKinley won in an even bigger landslide.

In 1901, Buffalo was enjoying the fruits of the Industrial Revolution, and launched the Pan-American Exposition, a world's fair. McKinley attended, and gave a speech on September 5, producing one of the earliest voice recordings of any President.

The next day, September 6, he was at the Exposition's Temple of Music, shaking hands with well-wishers. One man did not wish him well: Leon Czolgosz a 28-year-old Polish-American steelworker from Michigan, who admitted his crime, saying that it wasn't fair that one man should have so much power when most people had so little. At 4:07 PM, he shot McKinley twice in the abdomen.

Leon Czolgosz

McKinley was taken to the house of the Exposition's president, prominent Buffalo lawyer John G. Milburn. Vice President Theodore Roosevelt had been vacationing with his family in the Adirondack Mountains of New York State when he received word that McKinley was shot. He rushed by train to Buffalo, visited McKinley, and was told by the doctors that the President would recover. He took them at their word, got on a train, and went back to his family.

For 8 days, doctors tried in vain to reach the bullet. As with the assassination of President James Garfield 20 years earlier, they may have done him more harm than good. He died at 2:15 AM on September 14, 1901.

Vice President Theodore Roosevelt came to Buffalo by train, and was sworn in at the home of another major Buffalo lawyer, Ansley Wilcox, 1 mile south of where McKinley was being treated. (The Wilcox House has been preserved, and it stands at 641 Delaware Avenue. The Milburn House, at 1140 Delaware Avenue, was not, and was demolished in 1957.)

Artist's depiction of the Inauguration.

No photographs were allowed.

Roosevelt made no speech, no "Inaugural Address," aside from his statement when Hazel asked him if he was ready to take the Oath: "I will take the oath. And in this hour of deep and terrible national bereavement, I wish to state that it shall be my aim to continue, absolutely without variance, the policy of President McKinley, for the peace and honor of our beloved country."

Under the Presidential Succession Act of 1886, from McKinley's death on September 14, 1901 until the next Presidential term began on March 4, 1905, the man next in line for the Presidency was the Secretary of State, John Hay.

It took just 7 weeks to try, convict and execute Czolgosz, and even his fellow anarchists turned on him, saying he did their cause more harm than good.

The great fear of McKinley loyalists is that TR wouldn't continue McKinley's policies. Senator Mark Hanna of Ohio, the political boss who did more than anyone else to turn McKinley from a failed Congressman into a popular Governor and then a beloved President, but had opposed Roosevelt's replacement of the late Garret Hobart as Vice President on the 1900 Republican ticket, said, "That damned cowboy is President now!"

TR managed to have it both ways: He continued McKinley's expansionist foreign policy, but was considerably more progressive in domestic policy, just as Hanna had feared. In many ways, he became the 1st modern President of the United States.

He hated the nickname "Teddy,"

although he didn't mind people using his initials, "TR."

Hanna despised Roosevelt, and may have put up a candidate to oppose him in the 1904 election, possibly himself. But he died early in the year, and TR rough-rode his way to a landslide win. On March 4, 1905, he got a real Inauguration, at the U.S. Capitol, and used the same Bible he used when he was sworn in as Governor of New York in 1899.

Ansley Wilcox died in 1930. His house, at 641 Delaware Avenue, has been preserved as Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site. Judge John Hazel lived until 1951.

It has been suggested that Buffalo never recovered from the assassination, and that a curse was placed on its sports teams ever since. They've never had a Major League Baseball team since, unless you count the Federal League of 1914 and 1915. They lost the NBA's Braves. The NHL's Sabres have played for over 50 years, and have never won a Stanley Cup. And although the Bills won 2 AFL Championships, they've never won one in the NFL. Nor has any Buffalo-area team won an NCAA football or basketball championship. Because of COVID restrictions, the Toronto Blue Jays played "home games" at Sahlen Field in Buffalo in 2020 and 2021.

The site of the Temple of Music is now a suburban housing development. There is a historical marker at the site, at 17 Fordham Drive. This is 4 miles north of the McKinley Monument, in Niagara Square, on which City Hall stands. City Hall has statues of the 2 Presidents who called Buffalo home, Millard Fillmore (1850-53) and Grover Cleveland (1885-89 and 1893-97). 

A recent photo of the site

 

September 5, 1976: "The Muppet Show" Premieres

Top row, left to right: Dr. Bunsen Honeydew, Uncle Deadly,

Waldorf, Statler, Link Hogthrob, Dr. Teeth, Beaker.

Second row: Lew Zealand, Animal, Floyd Pepper, Rowlf.

Third row: Fozzie Bear, Miss Piggy, Camilla.

Bottom row: Gonzo the Great, Kermit the Frog, Scooter.

September 5, 1976, 50 years ago: The Muppet Show premieres on British network ITV. Joel Grey is the guest star. In America, it aired in syndication, debuting on September 13, with the episode featuring Rita Moreno. Given that the show took place in a theater, it made sense that, either way, the 1st guest star was a Broadway legend, as well as a Hollywood star.

It surprised me, as a kid who watched Sesame Street, that the only Muppet to cross over to this show (with rare exceptions) was Kermit the Frog, who hosted. I was being introduced to a bunch of Muppets I'd never seen before, and didn't know. But I came to know them: Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Gonzo the Great, Rowlf the piano-playing dog, Kermit's nephew Robin, and the two old guys heckling from the corner box, Statler and Waldorf, named for old New York hotels.

The band was Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. Dr. Teeth played piano, a hippie chick named Janice played guitar, Floyd Pepper played bass, Zoot played saxophone, and, of course, the drummer was Animal.

Floyd wore a military jacket and was meant to evoke the Beatles' character Sgt. Pepper. I didn't notice that at the time, but I did notice that all of the Muppets, including the bandmembers, were lefthanded. Eventually, I learned that this was not simply a coincidence: The reason was that the puppeteers would use their right hands to move the faces, and their left hands to move the hands.

Regular sketches included Muppet News Flash; The Dance, with dance marathoners making dumb "quickie" jokes, clearly a lampoon of the Cocktail Party sketch on Laugh-In; The Swedish Chef, whose indecipherable recipes always went wrong; Veterinarians' Hospital, with Rowlf as a doctor assisted by Miss Piggy and Janice; Pigs In Space, with Miss Piggy serving alongside Link Hogthrob as captain ("hamming it up" while sounding like Ted Knight's Mary Tyler Moore Show character Ted Baxter) and Dr. Julius Strangepork (a German-accented homage to Dr. Strangelove and Albert Einstein); Muppet Labs, with Dr. Bunsen Honeydew and his beleaguered assistant Beaker; and Bear On Patrol, with Fozzie playing a cop reporting to a desk sergeant played by Link.

Jim Henson voiced Kermit, Waldorf, Rowlf, Dr. Teeth, Link, and the Newsman. Frank Oz voiced Miss Piggy, Fozzie (name derived from "F. Oz"), Animal and Sam the Eagle. Dave Goelz voiced Gonzo, Zoot and Bunsen Honeydew. Richard Hunt voiced Scooter, Statler, Janice, Beaker and Sweetums. Jerry Nelson, better known as The Count on Sesame Street, voiced Robin, Floyd, Dr. Strangepork, Gonzo's girlfriend Camilla the Chicken, mad bomber Crazy Harry, and the dragonlike Uncle Deadly (formerly known as Skrid when the Muppets appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show).

The show ran 5 seasons, and was basically what Laugh-In had set itself up as a few years earlier: The last gasp of vaudeville. Not counting guest Muppets from Sesame Street, there were 128 total guest stars in the show's history.

Three married couples appeared together as guests: Roy Rogers & Dale Evans (stayed married 'til death did they part), Kris Kristofferson & Rita Coolidge (divorced) and mimes Robert Shields & Lorene Yarnell (divorced). One pair of siblings appeared, but not together: Country singers Loretta Lynn and her much younger sister Crystal Gayle. One parent-child pair appeared, but not together: Indeed, Candice Bergen appeared before her father Edgar and her "brother," Charlie McCarthy, did.

Since the show was taped at what is now the BBC Studio in Elstree, in Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, in the northwest suburbs of London, it was more internationally-oriented than most American TV variety shows. There were 97 Americans, 21 British, 2 Canadians (Doug Henning and Anne Murray), 2 Frenchmen (Charles Aznavour and Jean-Pierre Rampal), 2 Swiss (both of them members of Mummenschanz, which also included an American), a Dane (Victor Borge), a German (Elke Sommer), a Spaniard (Señor Wences) and a Russian (Rudolf Nureyev). The only one born in Asia was Juliet Prowse, born in India while it was a British colony. She was raised in South Africa, also in the British Commonwealth at the time, making her, despite being white, the only African host.

The oldest performer was 86-year-old Señor Wences, younger than George Burns by a few months, but older than Burns was when each appeared on the show -- and Wences beat Burns in final age, 103 to 100. The youngest was a 15-year-old Brooke Shields, the next-youngest being a 28-year-old Christopher Reeve. Zero Mostel was not only the first of the show's guest stars to die, but he died before his episode could air.

There were 69 men and 59 women. There were 9 black guest hosts. In order of appearance: Lena Horne, Pearl Bailey, Harry Belafonte, Lou Rawls, Shirley Bassey, Lola Falana, Leslie Uggams, Gladys Knight and Ben Vereen. There were 4 Hispanics, not counting the Spain-born Señor Wences: Rita Moreno, Raquel (Tejeda) Welch, Joan Baez and Lynda (Cordova) Carter. There were no ethnically Asian guests. There were 5 guests who are now known to have been gay: Elton John was already out, Rudolf Nureyev didn't exactly hide it, Jim Nabors and Joel Grey came out late in life, and Liberace denied it to the end.

Although the guests came from across the spectrum of show business, no guest came from outside show business. And 9 of the guests would also appear in The Muppet Movie in 1978: Edgar Bergen, Milton Berle, James Coburn, Dom DeLuise, Bob Hope, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman, Steve Martin and Paul Williams. (Charles Durning, who played the film's villain Doc Hopper, was never a Muppet Show guest.)

The last episode aired on March 15, 1981, with guest host Shirley Bassey, who, of course, sang the song for which she is best known: The theme to the James Bond film Goldfinger, in front of a bank vault while Link Hogthrob led a gang robbing it.

The cancellation was Henson's own choice: He wanted to stop making the show before the writing grew stale, or the quality faded. Also, with the The Muppet Movie's success, he wanted to move into movies, and thought it better to concentrate on that instead of the show. The Great Muppet Caper was released to theaters in 1981, and was also successful.

The Kind of Rutgers Loss Schiano's Hiring Was Meant to Stop

September 23, 1995, Giants Stadium, East Rutherford, New Jersey: Penn State 59, Rutgers 34. This was the game at Giants Stadium where Joe Paterno ran up the score, and Rutgers coach Doug Graber got in his face at the end, and Penn State's jackass fans called Graber out for having no class.

November 23, 1996, Notre Dame Stadium, South Bend, Indiana: Notre Dame 62, Rutgers 0. Live to a national audience on NBC. Losing away to the Fighting Irish was to be expected, but 62-0?

October 9, 1997, Rutgers Stadium, Piscataway, New Jersey: Syracuse 50, Rutgers 3. I was there. RU finished 0-11.

September 19, 1998, Carrier Dome, Syracuse, New York: Syracuse 70, Rutgers 14.

October 24, 1998, Rutgers Stadium: Tulane 52, Rutgers 28. Tulane hanging 52 on us? At home?

October 9, 1999, Rutgers Stadium: Virginia Tech 58, Rutgers 20. I was there, watching Michael Vick and a swarming defense led by Corey Moore destroy the Scarlet Knights. Somehow, in my mind, this got conflated with the '98 Syracuse game, which wasn't even at home, and entered my memory as, "I saw Michael Vick and Virginia Tech beat Rutgers, 70-14." The truth was bad enough. Oddly, Rutgers beat Syracuse that season, 24-21, the only win in a 1-10 season.

September 30, 2000, Rutgers Stadium: Miami 64, Rutgers 6.

September 8, 2001, Orange Bowl, Miami, Florida: Miami 61, Rutgers 0. This was the 1st game of the Greg Schiano regime, Round 1.

September 29, 2001, Rutgers Stadium: Connecticut 20, Rutgers 19. One point, but Rutgers was not supposed to be losing to UConn. In basketball, yes; in football, no.

October 13, 2001, Veterans Stadium, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Temple 30, Rutgers 5. Rutgers was not supposed to be losing to Temple. In basketball, yes; in football, no.

November 3, 2001, Mountaineer Field, Morgantown, West Virginia: West Virginia 80, Rutgers 7. These games run together so much, I thought I remembered being at this game, at Rutgers Stadium. Instead, it was on the road. I know I saw Rutgers get destroyed at home by the Mountaineers at some point. This season ended 2-9, but the losses were more painful than in the 0-11 and 1-10 seasons.

August 31, 2002, Rutgers Stadium: Villanova 37, Rutgers 19. Rutgers was not supposed to be losing to Villanova. In basketball, yes; in football, no.

September 7, 2002, Rutgers Stadium: University of Buffalo 34, Rutgers 11. I was there. Rutgers was not supposed to be losing to Buffalo. In any sport.

October 12, 2002, Rutgers Stadium: West Virginia 40, Rutgers 0. Maybe this was the West Virginia loss at home I was thinking of. RU finished 1-11.

November 11, 2005, L&N Stadium, Louisville, Kentucky: Louisville 56, Rutgers 5. RU seemed to have finally turned the corner under Schiano, going 7-4 and reaching a real bowl game for the first time ever. But this was a bad loss, shown nationally on ESPN2.

November 18, 2006, Nippert Stadium, Cincinnati, Ohio: University of Cincinnati 30, Rutgers 11. Coming just 9 days after the epic ESPN-prime win over Number 3 Louisville, it was like RU had fumbled the best chance it would ever have. Losing this game, and to West Virginia in double overtime 2 weeks later, cost RU the Big East title and the bid that Louisville got to the Orange Bowl.

September 7, 2009, Rutgers Stadium: Cincinnati 47, Rutgers 15. I was there. The season was over by halftime of the opening game.

November 20, 2010, Nippert Stadium: Cincinnati 69, Rutgers 38. Okay, the Bearcats had a good run. But the days when teams could score a point a minute on RU should have been long over. After the season, instead of staying to "finish the job," Schiano left, to coach the NFL's Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He flopped, miserably.

October 27, 2012, High Point Solutions Stadium (the first renaming of Rutgers Stadium): Kent State 35, Rutgers 23. Rutgers is not supposed to lose to Kent State. That's why the 1st game at the rebuilt stadium, on September 3, 1994, had Kent State as the opponent. RU won that, 28-9. Not this.

October 18, 2014, Ohio Stadium, Columbus: Ohio State 56, Rutgers 17. Welcome to the Big Ten Conference, Scarlet Knights.

October 1, 2016, Ohio Stadium: Ohio State 58, Rutgers 0.

October 8, 2016, High Point Solutions Stadium: Michigan 78, Rutgers 0. Ohio State were ranked Number 2 in the country. Michigan, Number 4. And RU had to play them in back-to-back games. Refresh my memory: Why was joining the Big Ten a good idea?

September 9, 2017, High Point Solutions Stadium: Eastern Michigan 16, Rutgers 13. We're losing at home to Mid-American Conference teams now? Get used to it.

September 15, 2018: David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium, Lawrence, Kansas: Kansas 55, Rutgers 14. This is another opponent where losing to them in basketball is understandable, but not in football, and not by this much. The season ended 1-11, although 3 were by 7 points or less.

The name of the stadium was changed to SHI Stadium in 2019. Greg Schiano, Rutgers' Deadbeat Dad, returned in 2020. Things weren't going so well, but not too badly, until...

September 3, 2026, SHI Stadium: University of Massachusetts 37, Rutgers 21. UMass hadn't won a game all last season. And this was supposed to be 1 of 2 games for RU that was clearly winnable, the other being Howard at home.

At halftime, with the score 28-7, a reporter for the Big Ten Network asked Schiano what was happening, and he said, "We're just a little bit out of whack right now." Ya think, Greg?

This was the kind of Rutgers' loss Schiano's hiring was meant to stop. The 1st time, and the 2nd time.

Instead, it was just another embarrassment for the school that played and won the first college football game, and hasn't done much since.

September 4, 2006: The Death of Steve Irwin

September 4, 2006, 20 years ago: Steve Irwin dies in a freak accident. He was only 44 years old.

Stephen Robert Irwin was born on February 22, 1962 in Upper Ferntree Gully, Victoria, outside Melbourne. His father Bob founded the Queensland Reptile and Fauna Park, now known as Australia Zoo. So Steve grew up around crocodiles, snakes and other reptiles, and learned how to handle them properly. Those of you who know Steve for his TV show The Crocodile Hunter, stop laughing.

Actually, don't stop laughing: Steve knew that much of what he did seemed silly to people. But it also raised awareness of the needs of wildlife, in his own country and all over the world. He became the most famous Australian alive, surpassing Paul Hogan, the actor best known for the Crocodile Dundee movies. (No, as long as Steve was alive, he was still ahead of Hugh Jackman.)

In 2000, Steve made a commercial for Federal Express, in which he was bitten by a snake, but, "No worries, mate: Luckily, we've had the anti-venom sent from America by FedEx! In my line of work, if you're not absolutely sure, you're absolutely dead!" Then somebody whispered in his ear, and he dropped his catchphrase: "Aw, crikey! It appears we've used a different courier, who hasn't arrived yet! It's okay bec-- " And then he keeled over, pretending to be dead.

That commercial was the first time I ever saw Steve. I didn't know he was a real guy who really did this sort of thing. I thought he was an actor doing a parody of nature shows. And no one who saw it had any idea that he would die on the job -- and from a creature considered far less dangerous than venomous snakes.

He was an avid sports fan, supporting Australia's highly successful national cricket and rugby union teams; the Essendon Bombers, an Australian Rules football team in Melbourne; and the Brisbane Broncos, a rugby league team in Brisbane, the capital of the State of Queensland. (Australia Zoo is less than 50 miles north of Brisbane.)

In 1992, he married Terri Raines, a veterinarian from Eugene, Oregon, whom he met the year before, when she was touring wildlife preserves all over the world. They had a daughter, Bindi, and a son, Robert.

Sadly, Steve would not live to see Bindi get married and present him with his 1st grandchild. On September 4, 2006, while filming a documentary off Batt Reef near Port Douglas, Queensland, with Philippe Cousteau Jr., grandson of oceanographer Jacques Cousteau, Steve was pierced in the chest by a short-tail stingray. He bled out, and there was nothing anyone could do.

Today, Terri, Bindi, Robert, and Bindi's husband, Chandler Powell, run Australia Zoo, while Steve is remembered fondly all over the world. In 2015, Bindi, only 17 years old, won the U.S. version of Dancing with the Stars. In 2025, Bob won Dancing with the Stars, making him and Bindi the 1st relatives to both win it.

In 2019, the YouTube series Epic Rap Battles of History did an episode with "Epic" Lloyd Ahlquist playing Steve, and "Nice" Peter Shukoff playing Jacques Cousteau. It was one of their funnier episodes.

Yanks Edge Angels, and Are Getting Healthier

Having taken 3 out of 4 from the Red Sox at home, the Yankees went out to the West Coast, to play the Los Angeles Angels and the San Diego Padres.

On Sunday afternoon, at Yankee Stadium, the Yankees played their best game of the season, beating the Sox, 16-1. On Monday night, at Angel Stadium of Anaheim, they followed it with their worst game of the season. Starting pitcher Elmer Rodríguez didn't get out of the 4th inning, and the Yankees committed 3 errors -- officially. Unofficially, there might have been an additional 3 plays that were scored hits for the Angels but could have been called errors. Aside from Spencer Jones' solo home run in the 5th, it was an awful night, with the Angels winning, 10-1.

On Tuesday night, the Yankees got back-to-back home runs from Jones and Jazz Chisholm in the 1st, giving Gerrit Cole a 3-0 lead before he even took the mound. But he wasn't a whole lot better than Rodríguez, not making it through the 6th inning. Fortunately, the bullpen held. The Yankees added some late runs, and won, 7-3.

The Wednesday night game was a pitcher's duel. Amed Rosario's ground-rule double scored Cody Bellinger in the top of the 4th, and that was the only run that Reid Detmers gave up through 7 innings. Cam Schlittler allowed only 1 baserunner, a single by Vaughn Grissom in the 2nd, until there were 2 outs in the 7th, when Grissom got a 2nd hit, a home run.

I don't like games on the West Coast, starting at 10:00 PM Eastern Time. And I don't like games going to extra innings: If you're gonna lose, do it in the regulation 9. I really hate when a late start goes to extra innings. But, after 9, this one was 1-1. It was "ghost runner" time.

Rosario was the Yankee runner. Jones struck out. José Caballero singled, but it wasn't deep enough to score Rosario. Chisholm drew a walk. Luis García Jr. popped up, and I was sure it was going to be a 2-1 Angels win.

Then came 4 straight singles, by Austin Wells, Bellinger, Trent Grisham and Ben Rice. It was 6-1 Yankees, and it seemed like the win was in the bag.

It wasn't. Michael Fulmer, signed as a free agent the preceding Saturday, had pitched 3 games for the Angels this season. He got Grissom out, then gave up a home run to Moisés Ballesteros. The game was once again in doubt. But he got Christian Moore to ground out, and struck out Jose Siri.

Siri, what was the final score? "Yankees 6, Angels 3." The Yankees took the series.

*

The Yankees trail the Tampa Bay Rays by 3 games in the American League Eastern Division. They have 22 games left: Tonight, tomorrow and Sunday, away to the San Diego Padres; September 8, 9 and 10, home to the Colorado Rockies; September 11, 12 and 13, home to the Mets; September 14, 15 and 16, away to the Minnesota Twins; September 18, 19 and 20, away to the Arizona Diamondbacks; a doubleheader on September 22, and single games on September 23 and 24, home to the Rays; and September 25, 26 and 27, home to the Baltimore Orioles.

If the Yankees take 2 out of each 3-game series, and split the 4 against the Rays, that will give them a record of 94-68. To top that, the Rays would have to evenly split their other 18 remaining games.

There is talk that Aaron Judge might be back for the Colorado series. I would love to see him tee off on the Mets. George Lombard Jr. and Clarke Schmidt also might return soon. Ryan Weathers and Angel Chivilli might be back before the end of the regular season; Giancarlo Stanton and Fernando Cruz almost certainly will not.

September 4, 1966: The 1st Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon

September 4, 1966, 60 years ago: The MDA Labor Day Telethon is held for the 1st time, hosted by singer-comedian Jerry Lewis. 

Lewis began hosting telethons to benefit the Muscular Dystrophy Associations of America (MDAA) in 1952, after a plea from a staff member who worked with Lewis and Dean Martin on The Colgate Comedy Hour. Lewis had previously taken part in what has been described as the very first telethon, a marathon 1951 broadcast benefiting a cardiac hospital that was organized by Budd Granoff, which featured the Martin and Lewis comedy team, who were his clients at that time.

Until their split in 1956, Martin and Lewis hosted these local telethons from New York together. Lewis then hosted it alone, and was named national chairman of MDAA, doing it on Thanksgiving Day in 1957 and 1959. In 1966, it went national, and was moved to Labor Day, previously one of the few national holidays without a major television connection.

It allowed for a 21 1/2-hour production, which Lewis would begin by singing Charlie Chaplin's theme song, "Smile"; and end with "You'll Never Walk Alone," from the Rodgers & Hammerstein musical Carousel. In between, there would be a constant stream of celebrities: Singers, dancers, comedians, actors performing scenes from Shakespeare's plays and Broadway musicals; and footage of the children the MDA was trying to help, who became known as "Jerry's Kids." Many critics slammed Lewis for appealing to pity, and sometimes the kids' difficulties were hard to watch, but it worked.

Initially, the Telethon was staged at the Americana Hotel, at 811 7th Avenue at 52nd Street in Midtown Manhattan. (It's now the Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel.) It had the necessary facilities: A ballroom with a stage big enough for a talk show-style desk, a performance area big enough for a 19-piece band, seating space, room for phone banks to take the donation calls, and a tote board to keep track of the donations coming in.

The tote board turned out to be key to the broadcast's success. With each new total coming in, a drumroll would begin, and Lewis would call out, "Tympanies!" and the new total would go up, to a standing ovation. The show's national syndicators were skeptical that it could work, but, at the end of the 1st broadcast, Lewis had to get on a ladder and add a number 1, because they had raised more than $1 million, which was a digit more than the tote board could handle: $1,002,114. (In 2022 money, that works out to a little over $9 million.)

By 1970, the Telethon was shown in 64 cities nationwide on "The Love Network." In 1976, it peaked at 213 stations, making it, if for not quite one full day every year, effectively America's 4th-largest television network behind the old standbys NBC, CBS and ABC. Also in 1976, the show hosted a reunion of, and an end to the 20-year feud between, Lewis and Dean Martin, arranged by their common friend, Frank Sinatra, who usually appeared on the Telethon.

One reason Sinatra appeared is that, in 1973, the broadcast was moved to his favorite city, Las Vegas, Nevada. That year, it broke the $10 million barrier in money raised. The 1976 reunion of Martin & Lewis must have struck a chord with many people, because that show was the first to surpass $20 million in donations.

The Telethon was held at the Sahara, then moved to Caesars Palace in 1982, and to the larger Cashman Center in 1989. In 1990, it moved to the Aquarius Theater in Los Angeles, then back to the Sahara from 1991 to 1995, then to CBS Television City in Los Angeles, and then in 2005 to Beverly Hills, and in 2006 back to Vegas at the South Point Hotel, Casino & Spa until 2011. It was still syndicated to 190 TV stations.

Lewis would always host for 16 of the 21 1/2 hours, taking time out for a nap, with Ed McMahon as his co-host, until 1999. By that point, he was over 70 years old, and had serious health issues, made worse by his obvious weight gain. He began hosting the 1st 5 hours, and the last 5, with McMahon (not exactly young and slim himself) and others filling in the gaps.

As Lewis got older, his health got worse, and his behavior became erratic. In 2011, he was fired as MDA Chairman and host. Starting that year, there were 3 co-hosts, all blonde women: Small Town Big Deal co-host Jann Carl, soap opera (and Hallmark Christmas Movie) actress Alison Sweeney, and Entertainment Tonight co-anchor Nancy O'Dell.

Without Lewis, the show was cut back to 6 hours on the night before Labor Day in 2012, and the last one aired on ABC on August 31, 2014. In 2007, the show topped out at $63,759,478 -- just under $90 million in 2022 money. Even in the last year, 2014, it managed to get a little under $57 million.

Lewis died in 2017, at the age of 91. As with many celebrities, the darker side of his personality came out when he was no longer able to fight back and sue. While he was great with his MDA "Kids," his real children, including rock bandleader Gary Lewis, said he was a rotten father. And many other people mentioned the kind of behavior, much of it misogynistic, that got him fired in 2011.

The Rutgers Football Team's Conference Wins Since Joining the Big Ten

Rutgers University off its 2026 football season tomorrow, home to the University of Massachusetts. They will start the season with 3 non-conference games, and then the Big Ten Conference schedule starts. As the late great college football broadcaster Keith Jackson would have said, From there on in, the social part of the schedule is over, and it will be strictly meat and potatoes.

The Rutgers Scarlet Knights joined the Big Ten Conference for the 2014 season. For most of their history, they were an "Independent" team. From 1991 to 2012, they were members of the Big East Conference. That league broke up, and in 2013, Rutgers signed a deal to join the Big 10 for 2014 onward, playing the 2013 season in the American Athletic Conference (the AAC or "The American").

Here is a list of all the Big 10 games they've won since joining:

1. October 4, 2014: Michigan at home, 26-24. This was a big deal at the time. Little did we know that it wouldn't get any better than this in the near future.

2. November 15, 2014: Indiana at home, 45-23. Indiana were awful then.

3. November 29, 2014: Maryland away, 41-38.

4. October 17, 2015: Indiana away, 55-52. One in 2015, followed by exactly none in 2016.

5. October 14, 2017: Illinois away, 35-24.

6. October 21, 2017: Purdue at home, 14-12. First back-to-back Big 10 wins.

7. November 4, 2017: Maryland at home, 31-24. Three in 2017, but none in 2018, and none in 2019.

8. October 24, 2020: Michigan State away, 38-27. This was the COVID season.

9. November 28, 2020: Purdue away, 37-30.

10. December 12, 2020: Maryland away, 27-24 in overtime.

11. October 30, 2021: Illinois away, 20-14.

12. November 13, 2021: Indiana away, 38-3.

13. October 22, 2022: Indiana away, 24-17.

14. October 14, 2023: Michigan State at home, 27-24.

15. October 21, 2023: Indiana away, 31-14. That season, Rutgers beat both Indiana and Miami, the latter in a bowl game.

16. September 27, 2024: Washington at home, 21-18. This was the 1st year that the Big 10 had taken in 4 former Pac-12 teams. It only helped Rutgers a little that season.

17. November 9, 2024: Minnesota at home, 26-19.

18. November 16, 2024: Maryland away, 31-17.

19. November 30, 2024: Michigan State away, 41-14.

20. October 25, 2025: Purdue away, 27-24.

21. November 8, 2025: Maryland at home, 35-20.

That's it. 21 conference wins in 12 seasons.

Or, to put it another away: Against Maryland, who joined the Big 10 at the same time, 5; against everybody else, 16. Against Maryland and Indiana, 10; against everybody else, 11.

Against the classic Big Ten, 15, 5 of those against Indiana. Against 1993-2023 admittees Penn State and Nebraska, none. Against Michigan, 1. Against Ohio State, Iowa, Wisconsin and Northwestern, none. Against Ohio State, that might be expected. The only excuse for not beating the other three, especially Northwestern, is Divisional play: Those teams are usually in another division, divided among geographical lines.

Of those 21 wins, 8 were by a field goal or less, and 13 were by a touchdown or less. None was over a team ranked in the national Top 25. Oddly, only 8 were at home. They actually do better on the road.

Can somebody explain to me why it was a good idea for Rutgers to join the Big 10?