Milestones: December 18, 2023

December 18, 2023 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

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THE RITES OF DECEMBER — THE NAME OF THEIR SHIP MIGHT HAVE EVOKED THOUGHTS OF SPRING, BUT IT WAS DEC. 18, 1620 BEFORE THE MAYFLOWER AND ITS PASSENGERS landed at what is now Massachusetts Bay. The passengers, who became known as the Pilgrims, were religious reformers who had been forced out when they disagreed with the state Church of England, with the monarch as head. The Pilgrims first settled in the Netherlands, which has historically been tolerant of several religious traditions. They then set out to establish a colony in America where they could worship in freedom. Having finally secured financing from London merchants, the Pilgrims set sail on Sept. 6, 1620, with 102 passengers crammed int the ship. The Mayflower was a merchant ship, not a passenger vessel and was equipped to transport merchandise like lumber, fish and casks of French wine.

Some reports indicated that the Mayflower reached land at Cape Cod on Nov. 9, but bad weather prevented them from going ashore until Dec. 18.

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PERSEVERED THROUGH TRAGEDY— DEC. 18 IS A SOMBER ANNIVERSARY FOR U.S. PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN, whose first wife and baby daughter were killed in a traffic collision on that day in 1972. The family was on a happy occasion to pick up a Christmas tree, with Joe’s first wife, Neilia, 13-month-old daughter, Naomi, and sons Beau and Hunter in the Chevrolet wagon, when a tractor-trailer broadsided them. Neilia and Naomi were killed. Beau and Hunter were seriously injured, with Hunter sustaining a fractured skull. Joe Biden, who had just been elected a senator, was informed of the accident as he interviewed staff for his first term in office. Although Joe Biden originally considered resigning before his first term, fortitude and the support he received persuaded him to serve, and he took the oath of office on Jan. 5, 1973, in his sons’ hospital room in Wilmington, Delaware.

Throughout his lengthy Senate career, Biden made the daily 2.5-hour commute between Washington, D.C. and Wilmington to kiss his boys goodnight.

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‘THE MOST FAMOUS MELODY’— A SONG TITLED ‘MBUBE,” the Zulu word for “Lion” which had its origins in Johannesburg, South Africa, became a number-1 hit in the United States on Dec. 18, 1961, but its originator never received royalties. Solomon Linda and the Evening Birds, a group of Zulu singers and dancers recorded “Mbube” from sub-Saharan Africa’s first recording studio. A copy of their regional hit made it to the United States, where a folklorist shared it with singer Pete Seeger. But, unable to understand the Zulu lyrics, he transcribed the central chant as “Wimoweh,” and the word stuck. In an ongoing exchange of the song, the Weavers and then the Tokens recorded it as “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.”

South African journalist Rian Malan’s article in Rolling Stone exposed the series of business transactions that essentially robbed Solomon Linda from ever collecting royalties on his own song, while music publishers collected millions. Seeger had considered the song to be under “public domain/folk.” He paid Linda a humble $1,000.

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WON 7 OSCARS — THE MOVIE “OUT OF AFRICA,” starring Robert Redford and Meryl Streep, opened in theaters on Dec. 18, 1985. The story follows the life of a Danish woman who falls for a game hunter and starts a school in East Africa. Most of the film was shot on location in Kenya, near the Ngong Hills outside Nairobi. However, the filmmakers had to import trained lions from California to the set in Africa — including the one whom the protagonist Karen encounters. Sydney Pollack directed “Out of Africa,” which won seven Academy Awards, including “Best Picture.”

Orson Welles, David Lean, and Nicolas Roeg considered turning Isak Dinesen’s book (pen name for Karen Blixen-Finecke) into a film before Pollack did so.

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7 NOMINATIONS BUT NO STATUES — ON THE SAME DAY, DEC. 18, 1985, THAT “OUT OF AFRICA” PREMIERED, SO DID Steven Spielberg’s movie, “The Color Purple.” This film took place in the U.S. South with Black protagonists, with Oprah Winfrey, Whoopi Goldberg and Danny Glover in lead roles as members of the Johnson Family. Filmed in North Carolina, “The Color Purple” is based on Alice Walker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning eponymous novel, chronicling the story of a young African-American girl named Celie Harris and shows the problems African-American women experienced during the early 20th century: domestic violence, incest, child sexual abuse, poverty, racism, and sexism.

Even though “The Color Purple” grossed $142 million around the world, and was nominated for 11 Academy Awards, it did not even win one Oscar.

See previous milestones, here.