November 25 in Pop Culture History

November 25 History, Trivia, and Fun Facts

November 25 History Highlights

  • 1783 – American Revolutionary War: The last British troops left New York City, three months after the signing of the Treaty of Paris.
  • 1952 – Agatha Christie’s murder-mystery play The Mousetrap opened at the Ambassadors Theatre in London, now the longest continuously-running play in history.
  • 1999 – Elian Gonzalez, a five-year-old boy from Cuba, was rescued by fishermen while floating in an inner tube off the Florida coast. He was later returned to Cuba.
  • If you were born on November 25th,
    You were likely conceived the week of… March 3rd (same year)

November 25 is…

Blasé Day
International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women
National Parfait Day
Shopping Reminder Day

November 25 Birthday Quotes

“All human history is the struggle between systems that attempt to shackle the human personality in the name of some intangible good on the one hand and systems that enable and expand the scope of human personality in the pursuit of extremely tangible aims. The American system is the most successful in the world because it harmonizes best with the aims and longings of human personality while allowing the best protection to other personalities.”
– Ben Stein

“Having fun isn’t hard when you’ve got a library card.”
-Marc Brown

“People who are unable to motivate themselves must be content with mediocrity, no matter how impressive their other talents.”
– Dale Carnegie

“Motivation is something nobody else can give you.”
-Joe DiMaggio

“The key isn’t winning or losing, it’s making the attempt. I may never be what I ought to be, want to be, but how will I know unless I try? Sure, it’s scary, but what’s the alternative? Stagnation… A safer, more terrible form of death. Not of the body, but of the spirit. An animal knows what it is, and accepts it. A man may know what he is… but he questions. He dreams. He strives. Changes. Grows.”
– Chris Claremont

“People often tell me I could be a great man. I’d rather be a good man.”
JFK, Jr.

November 25 Birthdays

1787 – Franz Xaver Gruber, Austrian organist, and composer (Silent Night, died in 1863)
1835 – Andrew Carnegie, Scottish-American businessman, and philanthropist (died in 1919)
1846 – Carrie Nation, American Prohibition activist (known for attacking bars with a hatchet, died in 1911)
1900 – Rudolf Höss, German SS officer (died in 1947)
1909 – P. D. Eastman, American author, and illustrator (died in 1986)
1914 – Joe DiMaggio, American baseball player and coach (died in 1999)
1920 – Ricardo Montalbán, Mexican-American actor (Kahn on Star Trek, Mr. Roarke on Fantasy Island died in 2009)
1920 – Noel Neill, American actress (Lois Lane, d. 2016)
1940 – Percy Sledge, American singer (died in 2015)
1944 – Ben Stein, American actor, performer (“Bueller? Bueller?”)
1946 – Marc Brown, American author, and illustrator
1947 – John Larroquette, American actor
1950 – Chris Claremont, English-American author (Uncanny X-Men comic books)
1955 – Don Hahn, American director, and producer
1960 – Amy Grant, American Singer/Songwriter
1960 – John F. Kennedy, Jr, American lawyer and publisher (died in 1999)
1966 – Stacy Lattisaw, American R&B singer
1971 – Christina Applegate, American actress, singer, dancer, and producer
1986 – Katie Cassidy, American actress

November 25 History

1792 – The Old Farmer’s Almanac first published by Robert B. Thomas. He added “Old” to the title in 1832 because there was so much competition in the Farmer’s Almanac business.

1884 – The patent (#308,422) for the process of evaporated milk was issued to John Meyenberg, of St Louis, Missouri.

1920 – The Philadelphia Thanksgiving Day Parade is the oldest in the US, starting on this date.

1937 – World’s Fair of Paris (Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne – International Exposition dedicated to Art and Technology in Modern Life) closed, with 31.2 million visitors.

1940 – Woody Woodpecker debuted with the release of Walter Lantz’s Knock Knock. He was actually the antagonist to Andy Panda (already established character) in the cartoon.

1947 – The Hollywood Ten consisting of Alvah Bessie, Herbert Biberman, Lester Cole, Edward Dmytryk, Ring Lardner Jr., John Howard Lawson, Albert Maltz, Samuel Ornitz, Adrian Scott, and Dalton Trumbo were cited for contempt of Congress for refusing to give testimony to the House Committee on Un-American Activities.

1950 – The Great Appalachian Storm of November 1950 impacts 22 American states, killing 353 people, injuring over 160.

1952 – East End Show – The Mousetrap (Play) November 25, 1952, at the Ambassadors Theatre in London, eventually becoming the longest continuously-running play in history.

1959 – Broadway Show – Once Upon a Mattress opened on November 25, 1959. The play was written as an adaptation of the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale The Princess and the Pea.

1963 – John F. Kennedy was laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery. The flags in Arlington National Cemetery are flown at half-staff from a half-hour before the first funeral until a half-hour after the last funeral each day. Lee Harvey Oswald is buried in Fort Worth, Texas.

1967 – #1 Hit November 25, 1967 – December 1, 1967: Strawberry Alarm Clock – Incense and Peppermints

1973 – Maximum speed limit was cut to 55 MPH as an energy conservation measure in the US.

1975 – The patent (#3,922,552) for a whole-body X-ray scanner was issued to Robert S. Ledley.

1979 – Pat Summerall and John Madden broadcasted an NFL game (Vikings vs Buccaneers) together for the first time.

1984 – Band-Aid which was founded by Bob Geldof to help raise money to assist famine-stricken Ethiopia, recorded the single Do They Know It’s Christmas in a London studio. The group included Adam Clayton (U2), Phil Collins (Genesis, solo), Bob Geldof (The Boomtown Rats), Steve Norman (Spandau Ballet), Chris Cross (Ultravox), John Taylor (Duran Duran), Paul Young, Tony Hadley (Spandau Ballet), Glenn Gregory (Heaven 17), Simon Le Bon (Duran Duran), Simon Crowe (The Boomtown Rats), Marilyn, Keren (Bananarama), Martin Kemp (Spandau Ballet), Jody Watley (Shalamar), Bono (U2), Paul Weller (The Style Council), James Taylor (Kool & The Gang), Peter Blake (credited as ‘sleeve artist’), George Michael (Wham!), Midge Ure (Ultravox), Martin Ware (Heaven 17), John Keeble (Spandau Ballet), Gary Kemp (Spandau Ballet), Roger Taylor (Duran Duran), Sara (Bananarama), Siobhan (Bananarama), Pete Briquette (The Boomtown Rats), Francis Rossi (Status Quo), Robert ‘Kool’ Bell (Kool & the Gang), Dennis Thomas (Kool & the Gang), Andy Taylor (Duran Duran), Jon Moss (Culture Club), Sting (The Police), Rick Parfitt (Status Quo), Nick Rhodes (Duran Duran), Johnny Fingers (The Boomtown Rats), Boy George (Culture Club), Holly (Frankie Goes to Hollywood), Paul McCartney (The Beatles, Wings) and David Bowie.

1989 – #1 Hit November 25, 1989 – December 8, 1989: Milli Vanilli – Blame It on the Rain

1995 – #1 Hit November 25, 1995 – December 1, 1995: Whitney Houston – Exhale (Shoop Shoop)

2009 – Wikileaks – Information about the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon were distributed online, with more than 500,000 intercepted pager messages, mainly from US officials posted by WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange.

Today’s Random Trivia and Shower Thoughts

A group of Prairie Dogs is called a Coterie.

Five Card Poker Odds, nothing wild: Four of a Kind – Four of the same number or “face card”, 1 in 4000

If we were able to travel faster than light and instantly moved 65 million light-years away and had a telescope big enough to see the surface of the earth, we’d be watching dinosaurs roaming around in real-time.

The official term for random symbols (#%@&!) representing swearing in comic strip speech bubbles is “grawlix” and that it was coined by Mort Walker, creator of Beetle Bailey.

The Capital of China is Beijing

“A census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti.” – Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) in The Silence of the Lambs, The Silence of the Lambs, 1991

“All of this has happened before, and it will all happen again.” – The Narrator #moviequotes

I wonder if children 400 years from now will watch movies like Titanic and learn about James Cameron just as today’s kids learn about Shakespeare.

Creator Chuck Jones said he created the Coyote-Road Runner cartoons as a parody of traditional “cat and mouse” cartoons like Tom and Jerry.

Civil War General Ambrose Burnside, from whom we get the term “sideburns”, was the first president of the National Rifle Association.

There’s an old nuclear bomb lost somewhere off the coast of Georgia. #true

What if time travelers already altered history and everything that has happened is already the best possible outcome. #StillMissTheBenswilers

Even Popeye didn’t eat his spinach until he absolutely had to.

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