 Police Gazette reveals the most obvious secret ever. 
This late stage Police Gazette was published this month in 1973 and features a cover triptych of Lorne Greene, Hank Aaron, and Australian actress Cathy Troutt, aka Kathy Troutt. Gazette claims that Greene planned to run for political office (he didn’t) and ponders whether Aaron can break MLB’s home run record (he obviously did), but we’re interested today in the Troutt story, which isn’t really about her but rather an entire group of female celebs whose secrets Gazette promises to reveal.
What are these mysterious secrets? Well, Vivianne Ventura reveals, “I would never allow myself to fall in love with a poor man.” Minda Feliciano says, “A man will drop everything—his business, his girls, his family—to follow me. I have that effect on men.” Gay Beresford says, “I adore money and luxury and flying to Paris and staying at the Plaza Athenee.” Emma Breeze says, “I prefer luxury.” So it seems the secret, which is no secret at all, is that they love money. Only Cathy/Kathy Troutt seems to feel differently, saying that she wants merely to settle down and have a normal life. Why she’s even with this group of women is perhaps the real mystery, but maybe she was the consolation prize for the Gazette’s decidedly non-glamorous demographic. Today Troutt maintains a very interesting website concerned with ocean diving, marine life and other subjects. You can see it here, and ten scans from the Gazette appear below.          
 In 1929 Max Schmeling was just another hungry young boxer. 
As long as we’re on the subject of promo materials (see next post), here’s another rare find. It’s a publicity still of German boxer Max Schmeling from late 1929, a time when he was being touted as a contender for the world heavyweight boxing title. The photo was shot in New York City, and was used as a press handout for newspapers and magazines writing features on the fast-rising fighter. Schmeling soon won the heavyweight belt, albeit in controversial fashion, and held it until 1932, when he lost to Jack Sharkey, also controversially. Actually, controversy followed Schmeling his entire career, peaking around the time of his second bout against Joe Louis, in 1938 at Yankee Stadium. The bout was billed “The Fight of the Century” because by then Schmeling had been anointed a hero of the Nazi Party (though reluctantly, biographers tend to agree), which made his first round destruction by Louis a cause for celebration (though it should be pointed out that many Americans, particularly some wealthy and prominent ones, were openly pro-Hitler). In 1939 the winds of war began to sweep across the world, and Schmeling fought for the German army in Crete. After the war he became an exec at Coca Cola in Germany, and amassed considerable wealth. Time passed, and he and Joe Louis became friends. When Louis died impoverished in 1981 Schmeling paid for a funeral with full military honors. Max Schmeling lived fourteen more years, finally dying this week in 2005 at the age of ninety-nine. He is yet another of those complex characters from history, which means we may revisit his story sometime down the road. In the meantime, if you’re inclined, you can read a bit more about the great Joe Louis here.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1945—Germany Announces Hitler's Death
German radio in Hamburg announces that Adolf Hitler was killed in Berlin, stating specifically that he had fallen at his command post in the Reich Chancery fighting to the last breath against Bolshevism and for Germany. But in truth Hitler had committed suicide along with his mistress Eva Braun, and both bodies were immediately thereafter burned. 1960—Powers Is Shot Down over U.S.S.R.
Francis Gary Powers, flying in a Lockheed U-2 spy plane, is shot down over the Soviet Union. The U.S. denies the plane's purpose and mission, but is later forced to admit its role as a covert surveillance aircraft when the Soviet government produces its remains and reveals Powers, who had survived the shoot down. The incident triggers a major diplomatic crisis between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. 1927—First Prints Are Left at Grauman's
Hollywood power couple Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford, who co-founded the movie studio United Artists with Charlie Chaplin and D.W. Griffith, become the first celebrities to leave their impressions in concrete at Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood, located along the stretch where the historic Hollywood Walk of Fame would later be established. 1945—Hitler Marries Braun
During the last days of the Third Reich, as Russia's Red Army closes in from the east, Adolf Hitler marries his long-time partner Eva Braun in a Berlin bunker during a brief civil ceremony witnessed by Joseph Goebbels and Martin Bormann. Both Hitler and Braun commit suicide the next day, and their corpses are burned in the Reich Chancellery garden. 1967—Ali Is Stripped of His Title
After refusing induction into the United States Army the day before due to religious reasons, Muhammad Ali is stripped of his heavyweight boxing title. He is found guilty of a felony in refusing to be drafted for service in Vietnam, but he does not serve prison time, and on June 28, 1971, the U.S. Supreme Court reverses his conviction. His stand against the war had made him a hated figure in mainstream America, but in the black community and the rest of the world he had become an icon.
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