As a child, I loved Bozo and was pleased to see his friendly face. As an adult, I’m no fan of grown-ups who wear rubber noses and hide their visage behind a mountain of pancake make-up. One of the creepiest of those performance artists was the infamous Wrinkles the Clown – but, as it turns out, Wrinkles was a hoax, after all. A pretty decent one, all things considered.
In regards to Britannica.com, it was famously known as the Encyclopædia Britannica when I was growing up. First published in 1768, a hardbound set of those books was very pricey back in those days. At $2,000 for the 2021 edition, the set still is. If you're pinched for cash, you can go to Thrift Books and pick up a used set of the 1952 edition for $7.79. Roughly the cost of a discounted paperback. After all, how much have things really changed in the last 69 years?
As it turns out, things have changed a lot and some of it for the better. Just look at this richest.com article: 15 Strange Things People Actually Believed 50 Years Ago, or this one, from grunge.com: BIZARRE THINGS PEOPLE BELIEVED 50 YEARS AGO. There's so much to be unpacked there. Asbestos. Conversion therapy. The horror of women with credit cards.
Next week, I’ll share why all of my future blogs will include some mention of that classic sitcom, Gilligan’s Island. Yes, I’m serious about this. No, it doesn’t make sense to me, either.