Do you recognize the guy above? He is an actor playing Francis Marion, AKA “The Swamp Fox,” a Revolutionary War hero — bane of the British and their Tory sympathizers in the colonial South.
Does anyone else remember him from "Forbidden Planet"? (And yes, even though I'm not British, I deliberately put the question mark outside the closing quotation mark. It's my small blow against illogical punctuation rules; the title isn't asking if the planet is forbidden. ^_^)
I learned that unless the quote includes a question mark or exclamation point, that punctuation mark goes outside the quote, but a period or comma always goes inside.
British English applies a "logical" punctuation system rather than a blanket rule. The actual British rule: punctuation goes inside closing quotation marks only if it's part of the quoted material; otherwise it goes outside. OTOH, American punctuation is typographic: how it looks on the page. i.e. visual smoothness, typesetter preference, or aesthetic tradition, not for semantic accuracy.
Doesn’t matter much. At my age, I do pretty much what I want. If someone corrects me, my standard response is “I’m old. Don’t bug me with the little stuff.”
Complexity doesn’t sell cereal. Moral ambiguity doesn’t sell toys. Historical accuracy doesn’t sell theme parks. Thus Disney, especially, became our unofficial historian by accident --- because it was the best at producing the comforting, history-sanitizing stories we craved during those unsettled times --- and at the scale TV networks and advertisers needed. But the fact is, the founding or frontier myth has always been our operating system. America's identity depends on these mythical stories with their solo heroes more than on shared ancestry, language, or religion --- stories that make America feel morally coherent, heroic, and destined. We Americans aren’t uniquely morally prone to "national amnesia" ---- we're uniquely structurally set up for it. When people come from everywhere, you need a shared story to bind them. And the belief that America is unique, morally superior and destiny-driven can't easily coexist with a fully honest historical record. On the other hand, it can with entertainment and from a practical standpoint as well since heroic myths are simply easier to write and produce: you've got your clear protagonist, a clear antagonist, episodic adventures and above all, moral simplicity. Perfect TV.
Congratulations and thank you, there is finally mention of a tv show/series that I was too young to have heard of! And here I thought I was getting old. Also, he looked SO familiar . . . Shirley.
I was too young, also. The first Disney hero that my friends and I loved was The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh, who later went on to become The Prisoner. At least, Patrick McGoohan did.
Loved SoRM. Disney and the Ed Sullivan Show overlapped and during the finale of Scarecrow, my older sisters outvoted me and the channel got changed to Ed Sullivan so they could see the Beatles' perform and I missed the ending.
I always loved and still remember the Scarecrow theme song, but I think the Best Theme Song Ever is from the early 1960s cartoon The Mighty Hercules, sung by the late Johnny Nash
Not only did I recognize Leslie Nielsen, but I started singing the Swamp Fox theme song before I scrolled down to it. I put the Ass in Aspergers. But I never knew until now that Swamp Fox was in color.
I knew it was Leslie Nielsen from the first instant I saw that picture. But I actually recognized him from the picture. Although my family did watch "Swamp Fox" when I was a kid, I didn't realize it was him.
One weird thing about (well, not really) him: I was just reading of his passing and in full celebrity mourning mode the morning after his death when I received a phone call from a close college friend of mine in Philadelphia telling me that my best friend in this life, my college roommate throughout my last three years as an undergrad, and a guy who was about as funny as Frank Drebin and was the life of every party, had thrown himself from the window of his 11th story apartment and had died that same day. That was a very bad day. I still miss the both of 'em.
Anyhoo, one of my favorite Leslie Nielsen scenes was when Frank Drebin was masquerading as that ridiculous MLB umpire. It makes me laugh just thinking about it.
I have all the "Naked Guns" and all six episodes of "Police Squad" (how could they have cancelled that great show so prematurely???) on DVD. I'll never get tired of watching them. I have several reasons for believing in O.J. Simpson's innocence (one of which is that I knew one of the chief investigators on his case from my days at DoJ. We spoke the day of the "low-speed chase" and he, one of the best and most astute investigators I had ever worked with, was fully convinced that it was a frame-up), but chief among them is that, well, Nordberg would never DO that!
As Gene points out, the tail was added to Marion's cocked hat by Disney as a marketing tie-in to the earlier wildly successful "Davy Crockett." Not taking any chances that viewers might miss the hoped-for connection, it was also mentioned in the theme song: "Swamp Fox, Swamp Fox, tail on his hat/" As it turns out, Marion and his fellow rebels wore even stranger headgear --- small, brimless and snug leather "hunting caps" which served a practical purpose in going through tree-lined swamps as well as an identifying feature --- one Continental officer noting Marion and his militia being "...distinguished by small black leather caps and the wretchedness of their attire." That's Marion in the blue hunting frock wearing the artist's stylized approximation of the cap.
Francis Marion appeared in an episode of the final season of Outlander. The actor was tall, dark, good looking, and wore a military uniform with a hat that was not three cornered. His function in the plot, as I recall, was as a temporary obstacle to the protagonists. There was no mention of him being called the Swamp Fox.
Recognize him? I can still sing the first few bars of the theme song! One of my favorite shows. What I did NOT like was sharing my first name with Leslie Nielsen, since I am female.
Surely! I spent a lot of years explaining that I was named after Leslie Caron. Now I have another female friend named Leslie and one named Lesley, which according to the Brits is the correct female spelling.
Linking two topics from these comments (1950s-era history-themed TV series and England (but not punctuation)), don't forget "The Adventures of Robin Hood". (Betcha lots of you can sing that song from memory: "…feared by the bad, loved by the good, Robin Hood…".) Not widely known at the time (certainly not by me and the rest of the pre-adolescent audience) was its role as an outlet for blacklisted US writers. See "Blacklisted writers" in the Wikipedia entry for more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventures_of_Robin_Hood_(TV_series)
I learned about those exiled blacklisted writers for Robin Hood some years ago; they wrote under pseudonyms. If you watch the series now (and I do!), you'll see how the plots often center on informers and the risk of betrayal. I watched the show as a very small child when it first aired on CBS, and then in syndication. I read that some local affiliates figured out who the writers were and stopped running the show because they thought it was subversive. Which it was.
Memory is truly an amazing thing. As soon as I read your reference to "The Swamp Fox" before I came across the link, the theme song began running through my head -- stored by an 8 year old's brain. I'll have to send it to my brother and see if his 6 year old brain retained the tune.
I was 6 years old when The Swamp Fox originally paired on Walt Disney Presents. Even as a child, I thought the production values were stunning. Didn't realize who played Marion until many years later when a few episodes were released on DVD. In the historical novel "Celia Garth," set in Charleston, Marion's fall from the window ostensibly occurred when he was drunk. Many, many towns and counties throughout the South and Midwest are named after him to honor his wartime heroics.
Does anyone else remember him from "Forbidden Planet"? (And yes, even though I'm not British, I deliberately put the question mark outside the closing quotation mark. It's my small blow against illogical punctuation rules; the title isn't asking if the planet is forbidden. ^_^)
I learned that unless the quote includes a question mark or exclamation point, that punctuation mark goes outside the quote, but a period or comma always goes inside.
Yup, that's AP style. (At least it was when I retired and gave up my AP Stylebook.)
Ah, thank you. Looks like I learned the wrong rule.
Yes, my husband and I both remember Leslie Nielsen in "Forbidden Planet". Great flick!
Robbie the Robot...we could probably devote a whole session to that amazing prop.
Robbie popped up all over.
FYI the soundtrack for "Forbidden Planet" has been remastered and is available through buysoundtracks.com
British English applies a "logical" punctuation system rather than a blanket rule. The actual British rule: punctuation goes inside closing quotation marks only if it's part of the quoted material; otherwise it goes outside. OTOH, American punctuation is typographic: how it looks on the page. i.e. visual smoothness, typesetter preference, or aesthetic tradition, not for semantic accuracy.
🎵 E-n-c-y-c-l-o-p-æ-d-i-a.
A singing john. Imagine that. And btw, we speak the Gene's English here so that should be, "E-n-c-y-c-l-o-p-e-d-i-a".
Didn’t know it was the British way. Just thought it made more sense.
It's not. My bad. See the earlier reply.
Doesn’t matter much. At my age, I do pretty much what I want. If someone corrects me, my standard response is “I’m old. Don’t bug me with the little stuff.”
Yes, I do.
Swamp Fox! One of the very first songs I recorded...back in 1961!
https://barrylou.com/barrys-earliest-recordings/
OMG !! This is priceless! It's like finding a home tape of 6-year-old George Carlin practicing dirty words.
THIS IS GREAT. EVERYONE MUST LISTEN TO BABY BARRY SINGING SWAMP FOX. IT IS THE THIRD CUT IN THIS ALBUM.
We took our kids to see you perform in Alexandria.
Priceless! "And now I'm gonna do . . . " Had the patter down early!
The British soldier at the bridge who takes the first shot at Nielsen is Bruce Dern.
Complexity doesn’t sell cereal. Moral ambiguity doesn’t sell toys. Historical accuracy doesn’t sell theme parks. Thus Disney, especially, became our unofficial historian by accident --- because it was the best at producing the comforting, history-sanitizing stories we craved during those unsettled times --- and at the scale TV networks and advertisers needed. But the fact is, the founding or frontier myth has always been our operating system. America's identity depends on these mythical stories with their solo heroes more than on shared ancestry, language, or religion --- stories that make America feel morally coherent, heroic, and destined. We Americans aren’t uniquely morally prone to "national amnesia" ---- we're uniquely structurally set up for it. When people come from everywhere, you need a shared story to bind them. And the belief that America is unique, morally superior and destiny-driven can't easily coexist with a fully honest historical record. On the other hand, it can with entertainment and from a practical standpoint as well since heroic myths are simply easier to write and produce: you've got your clear protagonist, a clear antagonist, episodic adventures and above all, moral simplicity. Perfect TV.
Congratulations and thank you, there is finally mention of a tv show/series that I was too young to have heard of! And here I thought I was getting old. Also, he looked SO familiar . . . Shirley.
I was too young, also. The first Disney hero that my friends and I loved was The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh, who later went on to become The Prisoner. At least, Patrick McGoohan did.
Loved SoRM. Disney and the Ed Sullivan Show overlapped and during the finale of Scarecrow, my older sisters outvoted me and the channel got changed to Ed Sullivan so they could see the Beatles' perform and I missed the ending.
Loved that one, too! Another great theme song.
I always loved and still remember the Scarecrow theme song, but I think the Best Theme Song Ever is from the early 1960s cartoon The Mighty Hercules, sung by the late Johnny Nash
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laoBvt9CcQo
I felt pretty good about never having heard of it too! Though I would have recognized Leslie Nielsen as soon as he talked on the video—unmistakeable.
Not only did I recognize Leslie Nielsen, but I started singing the Swamp Fox theme song before I scrolled down to it. I put the Ass in Aspergers. But I never knew until now that Swamp Fox was in color.
I knew it was Leslie Nielsen from the first instant I saw that picture. But I actually recognized him from the picture. Although my family did watch "Swamp Fox" when I was a kid, I didn't realize it was him.
One weird thing about (well, not really) him: I was just reading of his passing and in full celebrity mourning mode the morning after his death when I received a phone call from a close college friend of mine in Philadelphia telling me that my best friend in this life, my college roommate throughout my last three years as an undergrad, and a guy who was about as funny as Frank Drebin and was the life of every party, had thrown himself from the window of his 11th story apartment and had died that same day. That was a very bad day. I still miss the both of 'em.
Anyhoo, one of my favorite Leslie Nielsen scenes was when Frank Drebin was masquerading as that ridiculous MLB umpire. It makes me laugh just thinking about it.
I have all the "Naked Guns" and all six episodes of "Police Squad" (how could they have cancelled that great show so prematurely???) on DVD. I'll never get tired of watching them. I have several reasons for believing in O.J. Simpson's innocence (one of which is that I knew one of the chief investigators on his case from my days at DoJ. We spoke the day of the "low-speed chase" and he, one of the best and most astute investigators I had ever worked with, was fully convinced that it was a frame-up), but chief among them is that, well, Nordberg would never DO that!
I always thought that if there was ever a live version of Mark Trail (not the current version) Leslie Nielsen would have been perfect.
Would the birds and squirrels that often dominated the foreground have speaking parts?
Only if it was a Disney animated show.
As Gene points out, the tail was added to Marion's cocked hat by Disney as a marketing tie-in to the earlier wildly successful "Davy Crockett." Not taking any chances that viewers might miss the hoped-for connection, it was also mentioned in the theme song: "Swamp Fox, Swamp Fox, tail on his hat/" As it turns out, Marion and his fellow rebels wore even stranger headgear --- small, brimless and snug leather "hunting caps" which served a practical purpose in going through tree-lined swamps as well as an identifying feature --- one Continental officer noting Marion and his militia being "...distinguished by small black leather caps and the wretchedness of their attire." That's Marion in the blue hunting frock wearing the artist's stylized approximation of the cap.
https://www.americanheritage.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/SwampFox_Gathering.jpg
It's got a feather or some kind of plume in it, anyway.
Francis Marion appeared in an episode of the final season of Outlander. The actor was tall, dark, good looking, and wore a military uniform with a hat that was not three cornered. His function in the plot, as I recall, was as a temporary obstacle to the protagonists. There was no mention of him being called the Swamp Fox.
Recognize him? I can still sing the first few bars of the theme song! One of my favorite shows. What I did NOT like was sharing my first name with Leslie Nielsen, since I am female.
You should have been named Shirley! But I jest.
Surely! I spent a lot of years explaining that I was named after Leslie Caron. Now I have another female friend named Leslie and one named Lesley, which according to the Brits is the correct female spelling.
I was named after my grandfather. His middle name was Leslie.
You are female?
Yep!
I assume those of you from Planet Leslie come in peace.
It depends . . .
Maybe...
Linking two topics from these comments (1950s-era history-themed TV series and England (but not punctuation)), don't forget "The Adventures of Robin Hood". (Betcha lots of you can sing that song from memory: "…feared by the bad, loved by the good, Robin Hood…".) Not widely known at the time (certainly not by me and the rest of the pre-adolescent audience) was its role as an outlet for blacklisted US writers. See "Blacklisted writers" in the Wikipedia entry for more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventures_of_Robin_Hood_(TV_series)
I loved the Robin Hood series and yes I remember the theme song and all the words.
I learned about those exiled blacklisted writers for Robin Hood some years ago; they wrote under pseudonyms. If you watch the series now (and I do!), you'll see how the plots often center on informers and the risk of betrayal. I watched the show as a very small child when it first aired on CBS, and then in syndication. I read that some local affiliates figured out who the writers were and stopped running the show because they thought it was subversive. Which it was.
Rob from the rich and give to the poor, what could be more subversive?
Did they still run Rocky and Bullwinkle? Talk about subversive! 😆
Memory is truly an amazing thing. As soon as I read your reference to "The Swamp Fox" before I came across the link, the theme song began running through my head -- stored by an 8 year old's brain. I'll have to send it to my brother and see if his 6 year old brain retained the tune.
Hats never came off in the 50's and 60's. It must have been some kind of law.
His second. "Give me hand" should have been, "give me a leg up", but that is just the old equestrian in me complaining.
I used to watch that show. Sheesh.
I was 6 years old when The Swamp Fox originally paired on Walt Disney Presents. Even as a child, I thought the production values were stunning. Didn't realize who played Marion until many years later when a few episodes were released on DVD. In the historical novel "Celia Garth," set in Charleston, Marion's fall from the window ostensibly occurred when he was drunk. Many, many towns and counties throughout the South and Midwest are named after him to honor his wartime heroics.
"Aired," not "paired." Sigh.
You can click the three dots on your own comment and edit it.
Thanks
When I was in elementary school we played Swamp Fox vs. Red Coats at recess.