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20100. jexster - 9/2/2006 11:13:28 PM My Uncle Dick...last surviving of that generation of jexsters...
[he made the cover of Look magazine too]
Time Magazine
Monday, Sep. 26, 1955
Semper Chow
After one splendiferous night last week, about as many living, breathing citizens remained unaware of Marine Captain Richard S. McCutchen, 28—the first man to dare "The $64,000 Question"—as there are whooping cranes left on the North American continent.
To 55 million televiewers who saw him conquer an adman's dream of Everest, Dick McCutchen proved a perfect dish. Shaken well, he had the drawling deference of a vintage Jimmy Stewart, the nerve of a riverboat gambler, and the Montezuman morale of a Marine. Not the least, he had an astronomical gastronomical education, inherited from his globetrotting naval-officer father, who has spent years accumulating exotic recipes.
To Paris With Hunger. Now a 55-year-old retired captain (Annapolis '23), father John McCutchen first invaded his wife's kitchen in San Francisco in 1932; between "fiddling with cake-baking," he roamed the city's fabled restaurants, pored over cookbooks. For Dick's tenth birthday party he whipped out a succulent Lobster Newburg ("not exactly for a kid's stomach, but that's what he wanted"). Permanently intrigued, Dick thenceforth stirred while "The Skipper" mixed the local delicacies of Manila, Tsingtao or New Orleans. In Panama, on lazy Saturday afternoons, the gourmets caught and charcoal-grilled barracuda, red snapper or king mackerel together off Farallón Sucio.
The Skipper never served in Paris, the fount of his lore, but Dick did. Foresightedly, the Marine Corps sent the young officer there in 1952 to command the U.S. embassy guard, a plush detail enabling him to swallow new wines and sauces at great restaurants, while adding and subtracting their stars in the Guide Michelin. After a hitch in Korea (where raw spider crabs caked in crushed red pepper failed to thrill him), Captain McCutchen went to Ohio State University to teach naval science.
The Big Gamble. To a man with a wife and three daughters to support on $435 a month, "The $64,000 Question" seemed a highly interesting game. In June he wrote a semiserious letter to the producers, beginning: "Being endowed with normal mental faculties . . ." They paid his way to New York, quickly appraised him as a genuinely knowledgeable candidate whose "warmth" and "sparkle" made him an acceptable contestant. In no time he had mounted the program's cash "plateaus" by identifying flour in five breads for $16,000, five desserts for $32,000 (taxcut to $20,090), found himself with the option of going all the way. Getting ready for his final appearance last week, he took his uniform to be cleaned. Pleaded the tailor: "Let me take it to my synagogue tonight and I'll pray over it." Dick went back to boning up on Volume 23 of the Encyclopaedia Britannica (vegetables, vitamins, wines), The Wise Encyclopedia of Cookery and Simon's A Concise Encyclopaedia of Gastronomy.
As so often happens in final exams, the last minute cramming was wholly unnecessary. The question: identify five dishes and two wines on the now-famous menu of a royal banquet given in 1939 by King George VI for French President Albert Lebrun. The items: Consommé Quenelles, Filet de truite saumonée, Petits Pois à la française, Sauce maltaise, Corbeille, Château Yquem; Madeira Sercial. The minute he heard it, Captain McCutchen knew he was rich.* Inside the isolation booth he conferred with his father-advisor (for appearance sake only, it seemed), cracked his knuckles, and cracked out the answers. Squealed Emcee Hal March, amid crashing chords of The Marine Hymn: "If you're symbolic of the Marine Corps, Dick, I don't see how we'll ever lose any battles!"
Love That McCutchen. The program's sponsor, Charles Revson, president of Revlon Products Corp., had more than the occasion to be choked up about as he unhanded the Big Check. With an $11 million advertising budget, Revlon was spending a cut-rate $64,000 (plus prizes) weekly for a show that, according to one survey, was being watched on 84.8% of all TV sets in operation. So far, Revlon has paid contestants only $175,000 and two Cadillacs. Sales of such Revlon paints and powders as Love That Pink, Living Lipstick and Touch and Glow are up as much as 50%. Its nearest lipstick competitor, Hazel Bishop, had been forced to pass its quarterly dividend.
On the man Revlon could thank most last week, admiration descended from all directions. Headlined Paris Presse: PRESIDENT LEBRUN'S GREEN PEAS WON $64,000 FOR CAPTAIN RICHARD. British newspapers lovingly frontpaged the event. The U.S. Hearst chain extracted eight articles from McCutchen on his life and times (BE "CAPTAIN COOK'S" GUEST, shouted the headlines). State fairs beseeched his appearance. Publishers begged him to write cookbooks. In a New York delicatessen, the proprietor refused to let him leave without a 3-ft. gift roll of salami. But from Marine Corps Commandant Lemuel Shepherd Jr. came the most important response of all: Captain Richard S. McCutchen, USMC, was ordered to Washington to review the sunset parade and dine (on roast beef) amid the general's shimmering crystal. That almost equaled $64,000 (net $32,850) any time.
*He might have been less sure if asked to identify the entire menu of that 1939 dinner. Dishes left out: Rouennais à la gelée Reine Elizabeth, Garniture Buzancy, Mignonnette d'Agneau Royale, Pommes nouvelles rissolées au beurre, Poussin Mercy-le-Haut, Salade Elysée, Asperges vertes, Bombe l'Entente Cordiale, Cassolette Bassillac. Wines left out: Sherry 1865, Piesporter Goldtröpfchen 1924, Deidesheimer Kieselberg 1921, Perrier-Jouët 1919, Château Haut-Brion 1904, Royal Tawny Port, Brandy 1815.
20101. Trillium - 9/3/2006 12:12:47 AM Very best of luck to you in your educational project, Ms. No!
****
I just got an email from my oldest daughter with the caption, "Not for the Fainthearted". Ohmigod.
It contains pictures of her going skydiving!! Pictures from over a thousand feet up, looking down over her feet to fields far below! (3,000 feet?)
My tummy did flipflops just looking at the photos. Yeow! I never did this. Not sure I ever would.
It is so kind that she didn't tell me before she did this. My nerves would have been seriously frayed! 20102. wonkers2 - 9/3/2006 1:21:06 AM I reacted similarly to pictures of my daughter rock climbing. 20104. Magoseph - 9/5/2006 3:39:15 PM 20103 moved to Lies Have Consequences.
Good mornimg, everyone!
20105. RickNelson - 9/5/2006 3:59:56 PM Morning Mago, lot's of news up thread. Ms.No especially.
And for parents of grown daughters, I'm so glad mine has thus far only travelled to turn my hair gray.
I recall her Junior year in High School. I let her go to Italy. I called her every other day. Never got her, as I kept calling the places she had been the night before. Spent over $300 for that. Didn't regret it though. It was 2001 and I was hyper sensitive.
If my daughter went skydiving, I would not want to know either.
As for others kids-
What chokes me up these days are the lists of casualties, and those young faces of 18-late 20 somethings. 20106. judithathome - 9/5/2006 7:11:36 PM Hey, Magos...how's the weather up there? We had rain all night Saturday and all day and night Sunday...really nice and cool today but one nasty side-effect: mosquitoes. 20107. jexster - 9/5/2006 8:02:20 PM Mago
Love That McCutchen. {Time Magazine]
[my bad] 20108. Magoseph - 9/6/2006 1:09:55 PM Jex, your uncle Dick is a fascinating personage. How is doing these days?
Ms. No, I'm very happy and excited about your plans for the future. I can be a good source for information, you know--twenty years ago this fall, I started school and was rather an anomaly in class, a state you won't have to suffer.
Judith, it was a fall day yesterday, but we still have hope for an Indian summer like we had last year, one that lasted here into November.
After many family reunions the last two weeks, I'm exhausted and that accounted for my bursting in tears to the surprise of everyone when it came to say good bye to my younger son. I drove home sobbing all the way and berating myself for saddening everyone. The mother never dies in us, I guess. 20109. PsychProf - 9/6/2006 2:02:40 PM Thankfully so Mags. 20110. judithathome - 9/6/2006 10:32:33 PM My fiend Jen (from N.O.) came over and went to the pool with me but she was too chicken to swim because the water was frigid.
Anyhow, she's going to buy the house in Louisana closer to her family and Keoni's company is going to move her. She also is getting a cat...she got depressed the other day and went to the Humane Society to play with the cats...therapy...and this one cat, a Dilute Calico named Mae, captured her heart by sticking her paw out of the cage and beckoning to her. Jen concocted this theory that Mae was her calico from NO come back from the dead but drenched of bright color by Katrina...I went along with it and told her to go rescue that cat.
Which she is on her way to do, stopping off at PetsMart for food and cat litter after leaving here...I love it when fate brings two beings together! 20111. wabbit - 9/7/2006 12:27:19 AM Nothing like rescue cats. I have three that I adopted and one that adopted me (after being dumped out of a car in front of my house late one autumn). One was considered completely unadoptable, too timid to be with people. She is my doggie and while she's still shy, she forces herself to be brave and deal with whatever situation she is in. The shelter people wouldn't recognize her.
Back in the day, I recall a woman bringing in a ginger cat that she swore was her long-lost feline of a year or so. She was absolutely convinced that the cat had travelled hundreds of miles to be back in her arms. We didn't have the heart to tell her it had also undergone a sex-change. She was happy, the cat was happy, and all was right with the world.
Rock climbing is fun, if you don't value your fingernails and believe in belay. Skydiving isn't nearly as scary as you might expect, and it's crazy noisy until you pull the ripcord. And Ms. No is going to be a fabulous teacher. 20112. wonkers2 - 9/7/2006 2:01:45 AM No thanks to rock climbing or sky diving. Many years ago I nearly fell off the roof of a 3-storey building onto a paved driveway, and heights have bothered me a bit ever since. 20113. Ms. No - 9/7/2006 4:07:22 AM Just spent an hour or so rapping with my upstairs neighbor getting the scoop on everyone who lives around and talking about what changes mid-town/downtown Sacto has undergone in my absence. We're planning to put together a yard-party in the next month or so before it gets too cool. Everyone in my section of the building is relatively new --- he's been here the longest and that's only since March.
I have very cool neighbors, I'm quite pleased.
Classes are still great although I had a bit of a doubletake moment last night when one of the people in our discussion group said he believed that some of the witchcraft going on in the Salem era was real.
He believes that witches and Satanists have real powers.
I was kind of disappointed because he's otherwise a pretty nice kid. The night class isn't quite as good for discussions as the day class but it's larger and it isn't an honors class so there's no weeding out process. There's so much more that I'd like to talk about regarding the readings but there isn't really the opportunity to do so and I tend to look a bit freaky when I'm drawing conclusions and connections between the Puritans and the modern world. I can see the gleam in the professors eye when I start to go into a bit of this stuff though so at least I know HE thinks it's cool. ;->
20114. Ms. No - 9/7/2006 4:08:12 AM Mago,
My mom and I still get teary eyed at the end of every visit. I think it's sweet. It's good to have family that you not only love, but LIKE enough to care when you're out of their company. 20115. Ulgine Barrows - 9/7/2006 6:51:41 AM That sounds lovely, Ms. No, I wish I knew how to get there.
My memory tells me the whole house, but mainly my mom, breathed a sigh of relief when visitors left.
My son hates me, too, apparently, when his dad is out of town.
I wonder if I am mentally abusing him, but then I don't think he is recognizing his potential. And I should push him harder. He's lazy.
He wouldn't take any of my suggestions for the paper he has to write, due Friday. He still wants me to show up tomorrow for our regular Thursday lunch.
It's wretched, and I probably won't remember it a month from today.
eh, he misses his dad, and I miss my husband. I guess the lot of us like life in a ditch that never changes. 20116. Ms. No - 9/7/2006 8:07:52 AM Ulgine,
You'd be welcome anytime. We could sit around playing good tunes and sipping cool beverages while watching the parade of young male flesh go by.
20117. Ulgine Barrows - 9/7/2006 8:12:29 AM I remember my mom saying right about this time in her life - she wanted to run away - damn those patterns run deep.
I guess I just wasn't made for these times
Every time I get the inspiration
To go change things around
No one wants to help me look for places
Where new things might be found
Where can I turn when my fair weather friends cop out
What's it all about
~ Beach Boys
20118. Ulgine Barrows - 9/7/2006 8:27:34 AM goodbye, I think you're all lovely.
And I'm off, that is how it goes. 20119. Ulgine Barrows - 9/7/2006 8:32:48 AM Rock climbing is fun, if you don't value your fingernails and believe in belay. Skydiving isn't nearly as scary as you might expect, and it's crazy noisy until you pull the ripcord.
Soak it up, yeah, baby!
This guy I work with was in a freaking 4-month coma. He woke up, got his atrophied muscles working....and he is never gonna be the same man that he was before
Yiiipppoie hy aye 20120. Ms. No - 9/7/2006 5:39:22 PM How did he end up in the coma?
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