O Christmas Tree !

Ok, I realize that Thanksgiving is today. Stores, though, all have had their Christmas decorations up since the end of Halloween!

Here are two video gems from 1984. The first is the lighting of the Rockefeller Christmas tree. Years before NBC broadcast this event live for the entire nation, the New York flagship station (WNBC) taped it, and showed it an hour later for local viewers. The entertainment was so-so, but that old Rockefeller guy always pushed the red button (sometimes with help from some kids) to light up the tree.

The CNN coverage of the White House Christmas tree lighting is also a classic. Ronnie was at his best. He even stepped aside to let Nancy push the button.

Anyway, Happy Turkey Day!

Crash and Burn

After a short diversionary break, Vista-Vue Lounge is back! Let's take another journey in the way-back time machine to late November, 1984. The engineers at the FAA developed a nifty type of jet fuel that wasn't supposed to explode and burn upon impact (or so they thought). A full scale test was setup using a retired Boeing 720 jetliner. It was fully outfitted with crash test dummies, instrumentation, and probably the ultimate in radio control! A test pilot flew the aircraft remotely (sitting in front of a ground-based simulator), and purposely crashed it. As you can see from these two CBS news reports, the fireball was spectacular, albeit unintended!

Lets Go Mets

Ok, so they didn't do so well this past season, but years ago, they were something. In the fall of 2000, I took my son to his first major league baseball game....the World Series! Everybody was going nuts in New York (how could you tell!) for this subway series. In game 3, the Mets actually won this one against the Yankees.