HELLO NORMA JEAN

Not quite the same old song and dance.

Is it possible to get tired of Marilyn Monroe? We doubt it, especially when so many of the images featuring her are so arresting. Here’s a good example—it’s a Japanese promo poster for her 1954 western River of No Return, a Cinemascope production with Robert Mitchum at her side and Otto Preminger behind the lens. Unfortunately, Monroe and Preminger didn’t hit it off and the movie may have suffered a bit as a result, but it remains a solid effort and even if the story doesn’t rouse you, the Canadian scenery and Monroe’s saloon-singer costumes will. We should issue one warning though—the poster conveys a light-hearted mood, but the film is actually a straight adventure-drama. Still, anything with Monroe or Mitchum is worth a look. Incidentally, we saw this poster for sale at a couple of different websites, but be forewarned before you spend your hard-earned coin that the legit vintage version is double-sided. We’ve posted the reverse below.

Japan, Canada, River of No Return, Otto Preminger, Marilyn Monroe, Robert Mitchum, poster art, cinema

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

September 7

1978—Giorgi Markov Assassinated

Bulgarian dissident Giorgi Markov is assassinated in a scene right out of a spy novel. As he’s waiting at a bus stop near Waterloo Bridge in London, he’s jabbed in the calf with an umbrella. The man holding the umbrella apologizes and walks away, but he is in reality a Bulgarian hired killer who has just injected a ricin pellet into Markov, who develops a high fever and dies three days later.

September 6

1901—McKinley Fatally Shot

Polish-born anarchist Leon Czolgosz shoots and fatally wounds U.S. President William McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. McKinley dies September 12, and Czolgosz is later executed.

September 5

1939—U.S. Declares Neutrality in WW II

The Neutrality Acts, which had been passed in the 1930s when the United States considered foreign conflicts undesirable, prompts the nation to declare neutrality in World War II. The policy ended with the Lend-Lease Act of March 1941, which allowed the U.S. to sell, lend or give war materials to allied nations.

September 5

1972—Munich Massacre

During the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany, a paramilitary group calling itself Black September takes members of the Israeli olympic team hostage. Eventually the group, which represents the first glimpse of terrorists for most people in the Western world, kill eleven of the hostages along with one West German police officer during a rescue attempt by West German police that devolves into a firefight. Five of the eight members of Black September are also killed.

September 4

1957—U.S. National Guard Used Against Students

The governor of Arkansas, Orval Faubus, mobilizes the National Guard to prevent nine African-American students known as the Little Rock Nine from enrolling in high school in Little Rock, Arkansas.