Meme Scholar with Madness (PhD)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

At 12:01 AM ET on August 1, 1981, MTV launched with the words:

"Ladies and gentleman, rock and roll."

With that statement, MTV launched as the world's first television channel devoted to showing music videos.



MTV begins broadcasting in the United States and airs its very first video, "Video Killed the Radio Star" by British new wave/synth-pop group The Buggles. The guy briefly seen wearing black playing a keyboard is the one & only Hans Zimmer. The video was first released in 1979, when it originally aired on the BBC's Top of the Pops for promotion of the single.




MTV First Day Of Broadcast August 1, 1981: first 10 minutes aired:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sA_003itwcE

MTV Commercial Breaks (August 1, 1981)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-RozewW_3I

An attempt of REO Speedwagon’s "Take It On the Run", followed by the first major technical difficulty. This is how MTV’s bottom of the first hour ends: with a technical difficulty and big F.U. to the rock bands who would soon become obsolete. REO Speedwagon would survive, but most of their peers wouldn’t, so when MTV decided to cut off the failed video and go directly to the next one, it represented a far deeper message than anyone could have thought at the time. The ’70s were over, the ’80s were here, and MTV was in charge.

You can reminisce for 2 hrs on how it all played out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJtiPRDIqtI

They only had ~250 videos at launch because the music labels weren’t accustomed to making them nor did they know how.



August 1, 1946: President Harry Truman signed the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, transferring all control over nuclear weapons from the US Army’s Manhattan Engineer District to a new Atomic Energy Commission, thus establishing civilian control over nuclear weapons and nuclear energy. At least on paper and it went into effect on January 1, 1947...just prior to UFO's showing up.



Sen. Brien McMahon (D-CT), who wrote the original bill, went on to become chair of the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy (1949-52), the only congressional committee ever created by an act of legislation (the Atomic Energy Act of 1946). Also, in 1952, McMahon proposed an "army" of young Americans to act as "missionaries of democracy", which sowed the seeds for what later became the Peace Corps.

In January 1952, McMahon was mentioned as a possible candidate in the 1952 Democratic Party presidential primaries, but in March he was diagnosed with lung cancer and from his sickbed said:



God had other plans and on July 28, 1952, Sen. Brien McMahon died at age 48.

Sources: A History of the United States Atomic Energy Commission Volume II, 1947/1952, "Atomic Shield" by Richard G. Hewlett / Francis Duncan, 1972 U.S. Atomic Energy Commission; PDF pg 629, pp 584.

Pub. L. 79-585-An ACT For the development and control of atomic energy


Between 1958 and 1975, Johnston Atoll was used as an American national nuclear test site for atmospheric and extremely high-altitude nuclear explosions in outer space. In 1958, Johnston Atoll was the location of the two "Hardtack I" nuclear tests firings. One was conducted August 1, 1958, codenamed "Hardtack Teak" and one conducted August 12, 1958, codenamed "Orange." Both tests detonated 3.8-megaton hydrogen bombs launched to high altitudes by rockets from Johnston Atoll.

The August 1, Shot Teak, using an Army Redstone (von Braun) rocket to loft a 3.8-Megaton W39 warhead ~48 miles high. A programming error caused the warhead to detonate directly overhead instead of six miles to the south.

70 sec vid is French narration:


You'll note in that vid that even at that distance, the thermal pulse was so intense that observers on Johnston Island had to take shelter for a few moments. The explosion turned night into day. Within 10 milliseconds, the fireball was 10 miles across. At one second, it was 40 miles wide. This test disrupted military and civilian communications from Australia to Hawaii, and Johnston Island was effectively blacked out for 8 hours.

Shot Teak, (which was not announced ahead of time in Hawaii!) purpose was to assess the effects of a nuclear explosion's high-energy X-rays on reentry vehicles (to develop an anti-ballistic missile system and protect US warheads from explosions) and study disruption of radio communications, and probably psychological effects on the peasants in Hawaii.



Today it is still heavily contaminated (including Agent Orange) and is ironically, a National Wildlife Refuge managed by the US Fish and Wildlife Service. The island & entire Atoll is off limits to the public. It is uninhabited except for a handful of workers with the Crazy Ant Strike Team project, in a "Battle Against Acid-Spewing Ants" who live on the island for six months at a time with little outside contact. Ha, read that wild story.

August 1, 1961: U.S. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara orders the creation of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the nation's first centralized military espionage organization. Exactly 2 months later...



“Our world will be a safer and healthier place when we can admit that every time we make an atomic bomb we corrupt the morals of a host of innocent neutrons below the age of consent.”
— Conclusion of "The Corruption of Innocent Neutrons" essay by W.H. Auden, August 1, 1965.


LOL, Camp Baby Boom...ya know it just had to happen in real life...


Mother's Day tribute: Remembering mom of baby 'Trinity'


Aug 1, 1980: the sci-fi film THE FINAL COUNTDOWN was released. The USS Nimitz travels back in time to the eve of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Kirk Douglas orders F-14 Tomcats to "splash the Zeros".



August 1, 1971: Apocalyptic Heston...THE OMEGA MAN aka 'I Am Legend' is released.



Just a coincidence...




August 1, 1965: Frank Herbert's novel, Dune was published for the first time. It was named as the world's best-selling science fiction novel in 2003.



I used to do alot of dune buggy riding out here & ate a lotta sand too and had lotta sand in places I shall not mention.