• Wells Fargo Plaza in Houston and Kingdom Center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia are the 44th tallest buildings in the world. Guess which is which.

• The 44th Congressional District covers an area from Orange County to Riverside County in California.
• The French Connection won Best Picture at the 44th Academy Awards.
• Haydin’s Symphony No. 44 was completed in 1772. Haydin requested the symphony to be played at his funeral.
• U2 won Record of the Year, The eponymous soundtrack for O Brother, Where Art Thou? won Album of the Year, and Alicia Keys won Song of the Year (“Fallin’”) at the 44th Grammy Awards in 2002.
• The 44th Parallel North runs through France, Italy, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Serbia, Bulgaria, Romania, Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, China, Mongolia, Japan, Canada, and the United States.
• The 44th US Congress began March 4th, 1875 and ran through March 3rd, 1877.
• New Hampshire is the 44th Largest State in land area.
  
• Chile has the 44th Largest Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
• The 44th Season of the NFL began in 1963. The Chicago Bears would go on to defeat the New York Giants in the NFL Championship Game that year.
• The liberal party won the 44th Nova Scotia general election with 51% of the vote
• The 44th Parallel South runs through New Zealand, Chile, and Argentina.
• In 1990, The Grapes of Wrath won Best Play at the 44th Tony Awards.
  
• The 44th World Science Fiction Convention held in Atlanta, Georgia in 1986 honored Ender’s Game for Best Novel and Back to the Future for Best Dramatic Presentation.
• The Polish 44th Infantry Division was among the first units of the Polish Army to defend the country from the Germans in World War II.
• Wyoming entered the union as the 44th State on July 10, 1890.
• The 44th Century will last from January 1st, 4001 to December 31st, 5000. The Mayan Calendar will end on October 14th, 4772.
• Skyang Kangri is the 44th tallest mountain (at 24,754 ft.) located on the Chinese-Pakistani border. It was first ascended by Japanese mountain climbers Yoshioki Fujioji and Hideki Nagata in 1976.
• In 2005, King County, Washington was the 44th out of 50 highest-income counties by personal per capita income in the US ($48,216).
• The 44th Super Bowl (XLIV) will be held at Dolphin Stadium in Miami, Florida on February 7, 2010 and will be broadcast on CBS.
• You Nazty Spy! was the 44th short by The Three Stooges. It was the first Hollywood production to satirize Nazi Germany.
  
  The plot, courtesy of Wikipedia, is as follows:

  In the fictional country of Moronica, three munitions manufacturers—Messrs. Ixnay (Richard Fiske), Ohnay (Dick Curtis) and Amscray (Don Beddoe)—decide their country is in need of a change. They decide to implement a dictatorship, oust the king, and go about finding someone stupid enough to be a figurehead leader. Ixnay volunteers the three wallpaper hangers simultaneously working in his dining room-the Stooges.

  Ixnay presents Moe Hailstone, Curly Gallstone, and Larry Pebble with the offer to run Moronica. Moe is instituted as the leader (the Adolf Hitler role), with Curly as Field Marshal Gallstone, and Larry as Minister of Propaganda Pebble (an amalgam of Joseph Goebbels and Joachim von Ribbentrop). After his takeover, Hailstone proceeds to give a speech to the masses, cueing Larry to display signs reading “APPLAUSE”, “CHEERS” and even “HISS”. Moe “bonks” Larry after Larry accidentally raises the cue card for “HISS” at the wrong time during one of Hailstone’s speechs.

  However, the daughter (Lorna Gray) of the overthrown king pays Hailstone a visit, going by the name Mattie Herring (a spoof of World War I spy Mata Hari). The Stooges suspect she is a spy, and attempt to execute her. She escapes, and gathers a huge mob to storm Hailstone’s palace. The trio quickly abdicate, and flee into a lion’s den. A Lion is seen exiting wearing Hailstone’s hat.

• The 44th episode of Star Trek aired September 11th, 1996.
• Italy beat Belgium in the 44th Fed Cup, the most important competition in national women’s tennis, in 2006.
• Aishwarya Rai of India was named the 44th Miss World in Sun City, South Africa.
  
• Scottie Pippen of the Chicago Bulls was voted MVP at the 44th NBA All-Star game in 1994. The East All-Stars won, 127-118.
  
• Pirates of the High Seas was the 44th serial released by Columbia Pictures.
  
  Adventurer Jeff Drake sails to a Pacific island in aid of Kelly Walsh, an old friend whose freight line is being sabotaged by a ghost ship (such as the classic Flying Dutchman). Drake and Walsh’s investigation concerns the search for Walter Castell, an escaped convict who stole 5 million dollars in diamonds at the close of World War II. Several other people, including Walsh’s sister, all want to go to the island. Drake and his friends encounter multiple dangers when they are attacked by a gang also looking for the stolen diamonds. (Source: Wikipedia)
  
• The 44th episode of Desperate Housewives is entitled “I Know Things Now.”
• Ignacio Chavez was the 44th president of Nicaragua. His term lasted from January 1st to March 1st, 1891.
• The 44th mayor of New Orleans was Walter C. Flower whose term ran from April 27th, 1896 to May 7th, 1900.
• Joseph Rakowski served as 44th mayor of Jersey City, New Jersey. He is best known for addressing the issue of garbage trucks full of trash being stolen and driven from New York City  to Jersey City where they would be abandoned.
• 1946 marked the 44th season for the New York Yankees. The team finished with a 67-67 record.
• Asador Etxebarri was voted 44th best restaurant in the world by Restaurant Magazine in 2008. It is located in Basque County in Biscay.
• Franklin D. Roosevelt served as 44th Governor of New York State.
• Charlie Chaplin received the 44th Academy Honorary Award for “the incalculable effect he has had in making motion pictures the art form of this century” in 1971.
  
• A 2006 study ranked Alabama as the state with the 44th highest gross state product of $160 billion or $29,697 per capita.
• The US Census Bureau estimated that Oakland, California was the 44th largest city in the United States with 397,067 people.
• The University of California – Santa Barbara has been rated 44th among national universities by US News and World Report
• Israel is estimated to have the 44th largest economy in the world.
• The 44th Giro d’Italia, a long distance cycling race, was held in 1961 and was won by Arnaldo Pambianco with a time of 111 hours, 25 minutes, 28 seconds.
• Sonny Bono was a member of the US House of Representatives from California’s 44th District from January 1995 to 1998. He was succeeded by his wife, Mary Bono Mack.
• The UK version of the 44th Now That’s What I Call Music! series was released in 1999 and is the biggest-selling Now album in history with 2.3 million copies sold. Take a look at the track listing and you’ll see why.
  
• The 44th animated film by Walt Disney Feature Animation was Brother Bear, released in 2003.
• A 2006 CNN/Money poll listed Lee’s Summit, Missouri as 44th on the list of 100 Best Cities to Live in the US.
• Canadian Charles Andrew MacGillivary was one of the most well known members of the 44th Infantry during World War II. Upon hearing of the attack on Pearl Harbor, MacGillivary volunteered for the US Army in 1942. In January of 1945, he single-handedly knocked out four German machine gun nests and killed 36 German soldiers. He also would lose his right hand in the process (no pun intended earlier). He would receive the Presidential Medal of Honor for his efforts later that year. The letter from President Truman is below:
  
• The first use of a sky lobby in a building was the 44th floor of the John Hancock Center in Chicago. A sky lobby was also located on the 44th floor of the World Trade Center in New York.

Know other 44ths? Sound off in a comment!

1808 - The United States bans the importing of slaves

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1845 – The Cobble Hill Tunnel (Atlantic Ave. Tunnel) in New York City is built.

The tunnel is now abandoned, but still exists and is about 2, 750 feet long. The tunnel was originally just sort of a sunken train track used to rush passengers to ferries in Manhattan from Long Island. The trench was eventually covered up with bricks, turning it into a tunnel.  While it has been attributed to be the first subway tunnel, this claim is dubious since there weren’t any stations built along it. After the tunnel was closed for operations, it was discovered that it had been used for many purposes:

• 1916: The FBI (formed in 1908) breaks into the tunnel suspecting that German terrorists were making bombs inside. Nothing of the sort was found.
• 1920s: Mushroom growing and distilling of bootleg whiskey
• 1930s: New York City police break into the tunnel looking for “the body of a hoodlum.” The hoodlum was later discovered buried in cement, in a barrel, in Buffalo.
• 1940s: The FBI enters the tunnel again looking for spies

Schematics of the tunnel

Image of the tunnel circa 1980s

The tunnel today. Click for more pictures on Flickr.

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1863 - Abraham Lincoln signs the Emancipation Proclamation

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1880 – Ferdinand de Lesseps, despite not being an engineer, begins the French construction of the Panama Canal. It would cost an estimated $120,000,000. Adjusting for inflation, that’s a whopping $2,548,080,527.28 in today’s dollar. The French would later cease construction on the canal altogether and the US would finish the job.

The French attempt at the Panama Canal circa 1885

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1901 – The Commonwealth of Australia was proclaimed.

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1908 – For the first time, a ball is dropped in New York City’s Times Square to signify the start of the New Year at midnight.

1 Times Square: 1908 and a hundred years later in 2008

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1934 – Alcatraz becomes a United States federal prison.

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1962 – United States Navy SEALs established.

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1983 – The ARPANET officially changes to using the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.

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1984 – AT&T is famously broken up by the US Supreme Court into 22 different companies, only to reassemble itself some years later when it is acquired by parts… of its former self.

Funny enough, I was interning for Cracked.com in the summer of 2006, some time before this bit aired. I had put together an almost identical written piece, but we couldn’t print it because high-quality, print-ready versions of the old “Baby Bell” logos don’t exist. You can get away with it on TV since screen resolution is so low.

People Born

• 1449: Lorenzo de’ Medici (you know, like those guys who funded the Rennaisance)
• 1752: Betsy Ross
• 1735: Paul Revere
• 1863: Organizer of the modern Olympic Games, Pierre de Coubertin
• 1879: Hungarian-born film producer, William Fox. He’s the “Fox” in 20th Century-Fox.
• 1895: J. Edgar Hoover
• 1919: J.D. Salinger
• 1958: Joseph Saddler (you might know him as Grandmaster Flash)

1950s Commercial (Click to Play)

This man wants to tell children that Dentyne gum will come for free with Cheerios because Cheerios is made with oats to give you among other things, healthy nerves and teeth…. so if you’re looking to get healthy teeth, chew on some Dentyne gum, because that’s supposed to keep your teeth healthy and white too.

1960s Commercial

Team up with V8 and Cheerios for lots of energy! This commercial also boasts a giveaway for a free moon-related toy/game which looks really not that fun at all.

This commercial is from 1962 and emphasizes most of the same things from the 50s ad.

1970s Commercial

This one is for the child and acid tripper in all of us. Cheerios are groovy. Do you hear? Groovy. Also, I thought it was pretty funny how they chose to leave in video of the kid getting hit in the head with a football and missing the pass. And who eats cereal lying down in a field anymore? Pretty interesting to see how this was promoted as an “energy cereal.” Hopefully Red Bull never moves into the breakfast market.

1980s Commercials

GREAT BALLS OF POWER — FREE in Cheerios

This commercial from the 80s has a neat twist at the end. While you’re enjoying your breakfast, why not have some Skittles? That’s right. Why not have some Skittles with your balanced breakfast? And by the way, has ANYONE ever actually had the kind of “balanced breakfast” that they show in the ads? The type with a cereal, milk, orange juice, toast, a piece of fruit, and possibly lots of other things? I certainly haven’t, I’ve got things to do in the morning besides eat. The only reason this last part with the Skittles makes even a little sense is that they were only introduced in the US in 1981. They didn’t exist until 1974 and were previously sold only in the UK.

1990s Commercial

Apparently Cheerios needed a lot of improvement for some reason and so when the ’90s rolled around, General Mills changed things up and released this ad, boasting that the golden lil’ o’s will now be crispier in milk. It just SCREAMS ’90s . You’ll see what I mean once you see the deaf woman.

2000s Commercial

Many of you have probably seen this ad. Note the shift from the 50s from the “appeal to the viewer” form of advertising to the much more modern and subtle integrated promotional style. Lots of people don’t know this (or maybe they do) but this ad was actually first aired in the UK and stars British actors. They look pretty British, don’t they? The original version is pretty hard to find a good copy of, so here’s a quick and dirty look at the British one: