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August 9th, 2005
04:31 pm - Senator Claghorn, izzat you?!
According to Google Maps, Allen's Alley is located just off Tremont Street in Boston. It's the alley that runs alongside the Emerson Majestic Theatre.
"Allen's Alley" was a popular bit in Fred Allen's radio shows in the 1940s. In Allen's Alley, Fred (often with his real-life wife, Portland Hoffa) would pose a question to four different people of various "humorous dialects", all living along the same alley. A typical bit would include chats with such luminous personalities as the pompous southern Senator Claghorn (the inspiration, in name and demeanor, for Foghorn Leghorn), the longwinded poet Falstaff Openshaw (voiced by Alan "Fred Flintstone" Reed), a New England farmer by the name of Titus Moody, or Mrs. Nussbaum, a busy Jewish mother.
Considering Allen was born and raised in Cambridge, and more than likely got his vaudeville start in Boston's theaters, I'm willing to bet that this alley was named in his honor, with his blessing, and I bet the location next to the Majestic (a famous vaudeville venue in its day) had something to do with it, too. And I bet that if it was named in his honor, there may have been a ceremony to go along with it. And I bet this ceremony was covered by the local papers... which means...
TO THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY I GO!
Don't tell Don Saklad!
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![[User Picture]](https://l-userpic.livejournal.com/101190867/947214) | | From: |  gilana |
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| Date: | August 9th, 2005 08:52 pm (UTC) |
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Let me know what you find! this post prompted me to actually do some research on the man whose emails i've seen so frequently. wow. Has he been emailing you personally?! Holy cats, he's a nutter of the first degree! Actually, I feel kind of sad because he's definitely got a form of mental illness, but I don't feel so bad when he keeps on making requests of message boards and newsgroups that can't possibly be fulfilled.
A current game on one of the boards I frequent is to see if you can engage in an ABAB conversation with Don (the challenger being A, and Don being B.) If you can get him to reply, personally and somewhat coherently twice in the same thread, you win! no, i'm on an MIT mailing list that sees a lot of traffic from him, though it's not a discussion list (free stuff!), so i had no idea that he was so nutty. ![[User Picture]](https://l-userpic.livejournal.com/10106092/632017) | | From: | eeka13 |
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| Date: | August 9th, 2005 10:09 pm (UTC) |
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So far only two people have won the Don Saklad challenge. I've come close, but haven't gotten the final B to actually be a personal response. He posted a compact washing machine to Re-use, and when I called him about it, he said that he wasn't sure if it worked, having no room in his apartment to have actually ever set it up. Can't remember where he said he got it.
I spoke to a friend about it and he told me to run away really fast.... Do let us know what you find. I must confess I don't know much about Fred Allen (I'd even forgotten his wife's fabulous name), but I do remember reading about Allen's Alley. | From: | (Anonymous) |
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| Date: | August 11th, 2005 04:38 pm (UTC) |
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I always loved that Mrs. Nussbaum's husband was named "Pierre." Yep, traditional Jewish name, that.
Noah
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