Fun Facts: Gone With the Wind

Because of its length, the novel sold for $3 a copy, 50 cents higher than most hard-bound books of the day. The book weighed 2 1/2 pounds.

Gone With the Wind is the only book that Margaret Mitchell ever published. With Gone with the Wind she won the National Book Award for Most Distinguished Novel of 1936 and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1937.

Half a million feet of film were shot. All of it was edited down to only 20,000 feet.

When Victor Fleming came on board in February 1939, he rejected the script. Production was shut down for 17 days while it was rewritten by Ben Hecht. Hecht used Sidney Howard's original script (which he felt was superb) as the basis for his rewrite.

After the opening titles, there is a scene-setting crawl which was originally written by Ben Hecht. Nothing like this appears in the novel and, privately, Margaret Mitchell was none too enthused by it.

One month after the book was published, David O. Selznick purchased the movie rights from Margaret Mitchell for an unprecedented $50,000. At the time it was the highest sum that had ever been paid for an author's first novel. Realizing he had underpaid Mitchell, Selznick gave her an additional $50,000 as a bonus when he dissolved Selznick-International Pictures in 1942.

It is estimated that if David Selznick included all the dialogue from the book in the movie, Gone With The Wind would be about 168 hours long. And that is just the dialogue... they would still have to add all the dances and so on.

Mitchell told friends she considered Basil Rathbone perfect casting for Rhett (this was before he had played Sherlock Holmes on screen). When the press asked her for her choice, she threw them off by suggesting Groucho Marx or Donald Duck.

Vivien Leigh worked for 125 days and received about $25,000. Clark Gable worked for 71 days and received over $120,000.

After a few requests for background information from producer David O. Selznick's researchers, Mitchell refused to have anything to do with the film. She did not consider herself an expert on Southern history and did not want to be held responsible for any historical inaccuracies that might make it to the screen. Instead she suggested they hire Atlanta historian Wilbur Kurtz and writer Susan Myrick, who made numerous contributions to the production.

Gone with the Wind was the first color film to win the Best Picture Oscar. It is the longest movie ever to win a Best Picture Award, being almost 4 hours long.

 Melanie’s blue dress had the hoops removed and was only shot from the waist up since aspect ratio of the time couldn’t accommodate two dresses built with hoops in the same shot.

The biggest star to come out of the talent search was a New York hat model named Edythe Marrener. After testing her in Hollywood, Selznick told her she didn't have what it took to be a movie star. She decided to stay on anyway and changed her name to Susan Hayward.

When nobody could figure out how to shoot the camera movement at the end of Scarlett's first scene with her father -- which involved synching film of the actors, a sunset effect and two different matte paintings, all shot at different times -- production manager Ray Klune turned to the UCLA math department, which calculated the effect using advanced calculus.

Scarlett's retching in the "I'll never be hungry again" scene had to be post-dubbed, but the ladylike Leigh could not produce a believable sound, so de Havilland dubbed it in for her.

At the Oscar ceremonies, host Bob Hope quipped, "It's a great thing -- this benefit for David O. Selznick."

Margaret Mitchell did not approve of the text at the introduction that reads: "There was once a land of Cavaliers and Cotton Fields called the Old South. Here in this pretty world, Gallantry took its last bow. Here was the last ever to be seen of Knights and their Ladies Fair, of Master and of Slave. Look for it only in books, for it is no more than a dream remembered, a Civilization gone with the wind..."

There were more people in that section in Atlanta during the premier than there were at the height of the Civil War, when the soldiers were defending the city.

For the premier in Atlanta on December 15, 1939, the governor of Georgia declared a state holiday. Ticket prices for the premier were going 40 times the usual rate.

Selznick's first choice for Rhett was actor Gary Cooper. But he passionately rejected the role. He said "Gone With The Wind is going to be the biggest flop in Hollywood history. I'm glad it's going to be Clark Gable falling flat on his feet, and not Gary Cooper."

In August 1936, six weeks after publication, Macmillan estimated that if all copies of Gone With The Wind that were sold were piled on top of each other, the stack would rise 50 times higher than the empire state building.

Gone With The Wind stayed the #1 best selling book in America for 2 whole years (1936-1937).

The first scene to be shot was the burning of the Atlanta Depot, filmed on 10 December 1938. If there was a major mistake during the filming, the entire film might have been scrapped. They actually burned many old sets that needed to be cleared from the studio backlot, including sets from The Garden of Allah (1936) and the "Great Wall" set from King Kong (1933). The fire cost over $25,000, and yielded 113 minutes of footage. It was so intense that Culver City residents jammed the telephones lines, thinking MGM was burning down.

Mitchell wrote the end of the book first. She knew Rhett and Scarlett weren't going to make it. The first chapter is the one she wrote last, and it is also the one that she liked the least.

If ticket prices are adjusted for inflation, Gone With the Wind is the highest grossing film of all time. Behind Gone With the Wind comes, in order, Star Wars, The Sound of Music, E.T The Extra Terrestrial, and finally Titanic.

The horse that Thomas Mitchell rode was later Silver of The Lone Ranger (1949) fame.

There are more than 50 speaking roles and 2,400 extras in the film. 1,100 horses were used in this film.

Gone With The Wind is the 34th best selling book of all time.

1,400 actresses were interviewed for the part of Scarlett O'Hara. 400 were asked to do readings.

Prominent Atlanta preacher Martin Luther King, Sr. (father of Martin Luther King) was invited to the cotillion ball held in Atlanta at the film's premiere. King, Sr. had been urged to boycott the festivities by other community leaders because none of the black actors in the film were allowed to attend. A forward thinker, King, Sr. attended because he was invited - and brought along his famous son with him.

The film had its first preview on 9 September 1939 at the Fox Theatre in Riverside, California. In attendance were David O. Selznick, his wife Irene Mayer Selznick, investor John Hay Whitney and editor Hal C. Kern. Kern called for the manager and explained that his theater had been chosen for the first public screening of Gone with the Wind (1939) though the identity of the film was to remain undisclosed to the audience until the very moment it began. People were permitted to leave only if they didn't want to hang around for a film that they didn't know the name of, but after they'd gone, the theater was to be sealed with no re-admissions and no phone calls. The manager was reluctant but eventually agreed. His one request was to call his wife to come to the theater immediately, although he was forbidden to tell her what film she was about to see. Indeed, Kern stood by him while he made his phone call to ensure he maintained the secret. When the film began, the audience started yelling with excitement. They had been reading about this film for nearly 2 years, so were naturally thrilled to see it for themselves.

In 1939, the Hollywood Production Code dictated what could and could not be shown or said on screen, and Rhett Butler's memorable last line presented a serious problem. A few of the suggested alternatives were "Frankly my dear... I just don't care," "... it makes my gorge rise," "... my indifference is boundless," "... I don't give a hoot," and "... nothing could interest me less." Although legend persists that the Hays Office fined Selznick $5,000 for using the word "damn", in fact the Motion Picture Association board passed an amendment to the Production Code on November 1, 1939, to insure that Selznick would be in compliance with the code. Henceforth, the words "hell" and "damn" would be banned except when their use "shall be essential and required for portrayal, in proper historical context, of any scene or dialogue based upon historical fact or folklore ... or a quotation from a literary work, provided that no such use shall be permitted which is intrinsically objectionable or offends good taste." With that amendment, the Production Code Administration had no further objection to Rhett's closing line, "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn."

Clark Gable was so stressed out for the requirement that he cry when Scarlett has her miscarriage, he almost quit. Olivia de Havilland convinced him to stay, and cry. After watching a clip of him crying and one without crying, Gable admitted that when he cried, the clip was better.

Hattie McDaniel, who played Mammy, was the first African-American to be nominated for an Oscar. She also won. She would remain the only African American actor to win an award until 1964 when Sidney Poitier won the Best Actor Award.

None of the African American cast were allowed to attend the movie’s premiere. The fact that Hattie McDaniel would be unable to attend the premiere in racially segregated Atlanta annoyed Clark Gable so much that he threatened to boycott the premiere unless she could attend. He later relented when she convinced him to go.

Olivia de Havilland always meticulously researched her roles. As she had not yet had a baby in real life, she visited a maternity hospital to study how various women coped with the stresses of childbirth for the scene where Melanie has her baby. Off-camera, the scene's director, George Cukor, would occasionally pinch her toes to make her feel pain.

Although he was dismissed from the production, George Cukor continued to privately coach both Vivien Leigh and Olivia de Havilland at their request on weekends.

The character of Ashley Wilkes was based on Margaret Mitchell's cousin by marriage John "Doc" Holliday. Melanie was based on Mitchell's third-cousin, and Doc's first cousin and close friend, Mattie "Sister Melanie" Holliday. Doc moved West and became the gambler and gunfighter we know. Mattie joined a convent and became a nun, but maintained a correspondence with Doc.

The film has never been cut. Recent releases are longer because of the added Overture, intermission, and exit music, not because any deleted scenes have been restored.

The four principals were billed on the film's posters in this order: Clark Gable, followed by Leslie Howard and Olivia de Havilland and then "presenting" Vivien Leigh. This changed when Leigh won the Oscar.

David O. Selznick bought the rights to the best selling novel for $50,000. Louis B. Mayer, Selznick's father-in-law and head of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, was determined to make Gone with the Wind an MGM film. Mayer initially offered to buy Selznick out at a handsome profit. Warner Bros. offered Bette Davis, Errol Flynn and advantageous financing. Selznick's own distributor United Artists showed interest in providing a production financing package. However, none of them had an actor capable of portraying Rhett Butler except MGM, which offered a deal that included Clark Gable. After much vacillating on Selznick's part, a deal was struck with MGM on January 19, 1938 that gave Selznick Clark Gable and $1.25 million toward production costs, in return for giving MGM distribution rights and 50% of the profits, which were further reduced by Loew's Inc.'s 15% interest and a requirement to pay Gable's $4,500 per week salary and one-third of Gable's $50,000 loan-out bonus. Gone with the Wind was, of course, a box office triumph, grossing over $20 million during its initial release alone. Selznick eventually earned $4 million on the picture. Unfortunately, a few years later he sold his rights to John Hay Whitney for a paltry $400,000 to keep his independent production company afloat. John Hay Whitney later sold the rights to Gone with the Wind back to MGM for a $2.4 million.

The Ku Klux Klan was written out of the screenplay as the organization to which Frank Kennedy turns after Scarlett is attacked in Shantytown. Producer David O. Selznick said that he had no desire to remake The Birth of a Nation, telling screenwriter Sidney Howard in 1937, "I do hope you will agree with me on this omission of what might come out as an unintentional advertisement for intolerant societies in these fascist-ridden times. . . ."

Judy Garland was the leading contender for the role of Scarlett's sister Carreen before her Andy Hardy series co-star Ann Rutherford was cast, but she was tied up with commitments to another film directed by Victor Fleming: The Wizard of Oz. Ironically, Fleming would replace George Cukor on both The Wizard of Oz and Gone with the Wind.

The only four actors David O. Selznick ever seriously considered for the role Rhett Butler were Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, Errol Flynn and Ronald Colman. The chief impediment to Gable's casting was his MGM contract. Gable was not drawn to the material; he didn't see himself in a period production, and didn't believe that he could live up to the public's anticipation of the character. Eventually, he was persuaded by a $50,000 bonus which would enable him to divorce his second wife Maria ("Ria") and marry Carole Lombard.

Nothing in the internal memos of David O. Selznick indicates or suggests that Clark Gable played any role in the dismissal of director George Cukor. Rather, they show Selznick's mounting dissatisfaction with Cukor's slow pace and quality of work. Almost half of Cukor's scenes were scrapped or later re-shot by others. From a private letter from journalist Susan Myrick to Margaret Mitchell in February 1939: "George [Cukor] finally told me all about it. He hated [leaving the production] very much he said but he could not do otherwise. In effect he said he is an honest craftsman and he cannot do a job unless he knows it is a good job and he feels the present job is not right. For days, he told me he has looked at the rushes and felt he was failing... the things did not click as it should. Gradually he became convinced that the script was the trouble... So George just told David he would not work any longer if the script was not better and he wanted the [Sidney] Howard script back... he would not let his name go out over a lousy picture... And bull-headed David said 'OK get out!'" Selznick had already been unhappy with Cukor ("a very expensive luxury") for not being more receptive to directing other Selznick assignments, even though Cukor had remained on salary since early 1937; and in a confidential memo written in September 1938, four months before principal photography began, Selznick flirted with the idea of replacing him with Victor Fleming. "I think the biggest black mark against our management to date is the Cukor situation and we can no longer be sentimental about it.... We are a business concern and not patrons of the arts... ."

Writer Sidney Howard was paid $2,000 a week to do the screenplay. Many other writers contributed to the final script, with the final sum paid to every one of them being $126,000. Sidney Howard received sole screen credit. David O. Selznick also wrote much of the screenplay.

Even though he played Brent Tarleton in the movie, the opening credits mistakenly say that Fred Crane played Stuart and that George Reeves played Brent.

Margaret Mitchell's nickname was "Peggy."

Micheal Jackson paid $1,542,500 for David Selznick's best picture Oscar from Gone with the Wind.

Margaret Mitchell hated the sets for Tara and Twelve Oaks. She said, "I grieve to hear that Tara has columns. Of course, it didn't and looked nice and ugly like Alex Stephens' Liberty Hall in Crawfordville, Georgia.' And, "I had feared, of course that Twelve Oaks would end up looking like the Grand Central Station, and your description confirms my worst apprehensions. I did not know whether to laugh or throw up at the TWO staircases... God help me when the reporters get me after I've seen the picture. I will have to tell the truth, and if Tara has columns and Twelve Oaks is such an elegant affair I will have to say that nothing like that was ever seen in Clayton County, or, for that matter, on land or sea... When I think of the healthy, hardy country and somewhat crude civilization I depicted and then of the elegance that is going to be presented, I cannot help yelping with laughter..."

David Selznick used all 7 Technicolor cameras in existence for the filming of Gone with the Wind.

There were a total of 5 directors for Gone with the Wind. First was George Cukor, who was fired because Clark Gable didn't like him. Then, Sam Wood was hired to fill in. The director came in next, and got all the credit, was Victor Fleming. During the filming, Fleming collapsed from exhaustion, so Selznick called in two second-unit men to direct temporarily.

Fun Facts About Baseball

The first World Series was played between Pittsburgh and Boston in 1903 and was a nine-game series. Boston won the series 5-3.

The New York Yankees have dominated the amount of World Series Championships won. They have 27 under their belt, the next highest is the St. Louis Cardinals with 11.

The shortest major league player was Eddie Gaedel—he was 3 feet, 7 inches tall. The tallest player in MLB history is the Minnesota Twins’ pitcher Job Rauch who stands at 6 feet, 11 inches tall.

US Army during WWII developed a grenade that was about the same size and shape as a regular baseball making it easy to use for the American soldiers who had grown up playing baseball.

MLB National League (1876) predates the Football League of England (1888) and is the oldest professional sports league that is still in existence.

Carlos Beltran was the first switch hitter to hit 300 home runs and steal 300 bases.

The Star Spangled Banner was first played during the seventh-inning stretch at Game One of the 1918 World Series. The song became the official national anthem in 1931.

The tradition of spring training began in 1886. Continuing into the 1940’s, the Boston Red Sox, the Cincinnati Reds, the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Highlanders (now the New York Yankees) got ready for the baseball season in Hot Springs, Arkansas.

A regulation baseball has 108 stitches

San Francisco Giants pitcher Gaylord Perry was not much of a hitter. In 1962 Giants manager joked that “They’ll put a man on the moon before Gaylord Perry hits a home run.” During a game on July 20th, 1969, a mere 20 minutes after Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, Perry stepped to the plate and hit his first career home run.

Boston Red Sox slugger, Ted Williams (1918-2002) missed almost five full baseball seasons while serving as a fighter pilot in WWII and the Korean War and still managed to hit 521 home runs.

The Yankees, Cubs, Angels and Dodgers are the only four MLB teams that lack a mascot. The Yankees used to have one, but he quit after being beaten up by fans, who didn’t want a mascot.

The average life span of a major league baseball is 6-7 pitches.

Deion Sanders is the only person to hit an MLB home run and NFL touchdown in the same week. He's also the only person to play in the World Series and the Super Bowl. 

The record for lowest attendance at an MLB game is 347 fans! It was in Florida - the Marlins versus the Reds - and it happened during Hurricane Irene. 

Every MLB ball is covered in mud from a secret location in New Jersey that only one man knows. It’s called Lena Blackburne Baseball Rubbing mud, and is used to allow pitchers to have a better grip on the balls. When Lena Blackburne was a third base coach for the Philadelphia Athletics in 1938, he decided to set off on a search for something better than tobacco spit to use. He found the perfect mixture of mud within 10 years, said to be somewhere near Palmyra, New Jersey, and then founded the company to sell it. By the 1950’s, it was so popular that every major league team was using it. Today, only the company’s owner, Jim Bintliff, knows the location. The mud is cleaned and screened, and a secret ingredient is added before sale. Bintliff takes 1,000 pounds of mud once a year, every year, and sells it the next season. It’s today considered the perfect rubbing mud. 

Philadelphia A's (now the Oakland Athletics) manager Connie Mack has 3,755 career victories, more than any other manager in history.

Facts about feet

There are a ton of references to feet in the play Rx. In honor of this quirk, here are some facts about feet that you probably didn't know. 

• The foot is an intricate structure containing 26 bones with thirty-three joints, 107 ligaments, 19 muscles and multiple tendons that hold the structure together and allow it to move in a variety of ways.

• Those same 52 bones in your pair of feet account for one quarter of all of the bones in your body.

• Though the United States measures a foot as being twelve inches, the average size of American feet are 10.5 (10.81 inches) for men, and 8.5 (9.1 inches) for women.

• Human feet have more sweat glands than any other part of the body, roughly 125,000 per foot. Human feet can also sweat up to a pint of fluid a day.

• One of the reasons that feet are so ticklish is because there are more sensory nerve endings per inch than in any other place on the body.

• As many as 90% of women in the United States wear a shoe size that is too small. 

• Your feet are a good guide to your overall health, as they are one of the first areas of your body to show signs of illness. Hairless toes can be a sign of poor blood circulation and any indentations in your toenails can also be a sign of disease. Any changes you notice in your feet should be reported to your doctor.

• Though many people consider feet to be ugly, many more spend big bucks to make theirs prettier. An estimated $6 billion is spent in the US every year on manicures and pedicures. This total only goes up when we add in the cost of jewelry, hosiery and designer footwear as well as the occasional foot tattoo.

• There are times when you're walking that the pressure on your feet exceeds your body weight, and when you're running, it can be three or four times your weight.

• An average, healthy person should aim to take 8,000 to 10,000 steps a day. That covers several miles and adds up to about 115,000 miles in a lifetime. By age 70, the average person will have walked the equivalent of 4 times around the globe.

• Walking is the best exercise for your feet. It also contributes to your general health by improving circulation, contributing to weight control and promoting all-around well being.

• Fingernails and toenails grow faster during hot weather, pregnancy and teenage years. 

• The ancient Romans were the first to construct distinct left and right shoes. Before that, shoes could be worn on either foot.

• The average foot gets two sizes longer when a person stands up. 

• Shoe sizes were devised in England by King Edward II who declared in 1324 that the diameter of one barely corn- a third of an inch- would represent one full shoe size. That’s still true today. 

• Shopping for shoes is best done in the afternoon. Your feet tend to swell a little during the day, and it's best to buy shoes to fit them then. Have your feet measured every time you purchase shoes, and do it while you're standing. When you try on shoes, try them on both feet; many people have one foot larger than the other, and it's best to fit the larger one.

Eight fun facts about pharmaceuticals

1. Cannabis hemp was actually used as currency from 1631 all the way up until the early 1800s. Why? Blame the British: The English navy became solely dependent on cannabis hemp fibers for the production of ropes and sails for its fleet (hence, the term “canvas”). So central did cannabis become to the economy that early colonial law actually mandated that farmers grow the crop. 

2. Bayer, the pharmaceutical giant responsible for Aspirin, once marketed heroin as a non-addictive morphine substitute and cough suppressant.

3. In 2008, research found that pharmaceutical companies spent twice as much money on advertisement than they did on research. What's more, they typically would buy research from leading universities instead of doing it themselves.

4. Between the years of 1980 and 2010, the price of prescription drugs increased by 300%.

5. Cocaine was the first local anesthetic, having been used as such from 1884 and onwards. 

6. History records Robert Shoemaker, producer of glycerin, as the first large-scale manufacturer in the period from 1818 to 1840. Medicines were previously manufactured in the laboratories of pharmacies where doctors and pharmacists compounded and administered drugs to patients and observed drug reactions. 

7. Every year since 1982, the pharmaceutical industry has been the most profitable. In fact, it has averaged 3 times the return on revenue more than the average return from any other industry represented in the global Fortune 500.

8. Funding for malaria research is 80 times lower than for HIV/AIDS and 20 times lower than for asthma – and malaria gets the most research funding of all tropical diseases. Malaria kills one child every 30 seconds. Only 10% of global health research (private and public combined) is devoted to diseases that account for 90% of the world’s disease burden.

The History of the Turkey Pardon

The play November deals with the controversial topic of presidential pardons of... turkeys. I got curious as to where this tradition got started. Here's what the White House website has to say:

Americans have been sending the President turkeys for the holidays since at least the 19th century. Beginning in 1873 during Grant’s presidency, a Rhode Island man named Horace Vose was responsible for “selecting with the utmost care” the “noblest gobbler in all that little state” for the President’s Thanksgiving dinner, a tradition he carried out for more than 25 years according to The New York Times. In 1947, the National Turkey Federation took on the role of official turkey supplier to the President, delivering a 47-pound bird in time for the Christmas holiday.

That year, the White House also began holding a turkey receiving ceremony, usually in the Rose Garden, providing a photo op that many confuse with the beginning of the pardoning tradition. Back then, however, birds were more likely to be destined for the White House dining table than the easy life on a farm. In 1948, President Truman said he would take the gifted turkey home to Independence, Missouri, where his 25 relatives “require a lot.”

So then when did the pardoning start? Here’s where it gets tricky. Tales of spared turkeys date back to the Lincoln days. According to one story, Lincoln’s son Tad begged his father to write out a presidential pardon for the bird meant for the family’s Christmas table, arguing it had as much a right to live as anyone. Lincoln acquiesced and the turkey lived.

In 1963, President Kennedy decided to send that year’s gift from the National Turkey Federation back to the farm where it came from. “We’ll just let this one grow,” he said. Sometime around the Nixon administration, the President began sending the turkey to a petting farm near Washington after holding the traditional receiving ceremony and photo op, although no formal pardon was given. 

President George H.W. Bush was the first to actually offer a turkey pardon. On November 14, 1989, he announced that year’s bird had “been granted a presidential pardon as of right now.” He sent the turkey on his way to the perhaps unfortunately named Frying Pan Park in Herndon, Virginia, and with that, a tradition was born.

In 2009 President Obama admitted that Courage, that year’s top turkey, came dangerously close to gracing the White House table. “Thanks to the intervention of Malia and Sasha – because I was ready to eat this sucker – Courage will also be spared this terrible and delicious fate."

"I'm told Presidents Eisenhower and Johnson actually ate their turkeys," Obama said. "You can't fault them for that; that's a good-looking bird."

Here's the Presidential turkey pardon ceremony from 2010. 

Everyone in the cast and crew of November wishes you and yours a very happy Thanksgiving!

The Art of Acoustics

During our down time we took a crack at addressing some issues with the new facility. Among these issues were the sound. Acoustics is the science of sound as it reacts to air, water and solid materials. There's s a whole branch of the science called architectural acoustics that studies how sound plays out in buildings like theaters. So we talked to some folks who know something about architectural acoustics and had them help us address the sound issue in the new space. 

The basics are like this: sound travels in a wave and it bounces off of solid surfaces - surfaces like polished granite, cinder block walls, and so on. This is how you get echoes. Lots of things absorb sound, but in this case, people, their clothes, their wool coats, and so on. So a play rehearsing in an empty house is going to sound much different than a play performing in front of a full house. Anyway, as a result, we've had some new acoustical tile and foam installed in the ceiling to address the sound bounce off the flooring and seating and walls. It's already made a difference so we're hoping that this will be our fix. Isn't building a new home fun? :) 

If you want to learn more about acoustics, How Stuff Works has an interesting series, as does the NTD Center. 

 

What is schizophrenia?

Schizophrenia is a mental disorder that makes it hard to:

• Tell the difference between what is real and not real
• Think clearly
• Have normal emotional responses
• Act normally in social situations

Causes, incidence, and risk factors

Schizophrenia affects both men and women equally. It usually begins in the teen years or young adulthood, but it may begin later in life. It tends to begin later in women, and is more mild.

Schizophrenia symptoms usually develop slowly over months or years. Sometimes you may have many symptoms, and at other times you may only have a few symptoms.

People with any type of schizophrenia may have trouble keeping friends and working. They may also have problems with anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts or behaviors.

At first, you may have the following symptoms:

• Irritable or tense feeling
• Trouble concentrating
• Trouble sleeping

As the illness continues, you may have problems with thinking, emotions, and behavior, including:

• Bizarre behaviors
• Hearing or seeing things that are not there (hallucinations)
• Isolation
• Lack of emotion (flat affect)
• Problems paying attention
• Strongly held beliefs that are not real (delusions)
• Thoughts that "jump" between different topics (“loose associations”)

Symptoms depend on the type of schizophrenia you have.

Paranoid schizophrenia symptoms may include:

• Anxiety
• Anger or arguing
• False beliefs that others are trying to harm you or your loved ones

Disorganized schizophrenia symptoms may include:

• Childlike behavior
• Problems thinking and explaining your ideas clearly
• Showing little emotion

During an episode of schizophrenia, you may need to stay in the hospital for safety reasons.

Medications

Antipsychotic medications are the most effective treatment for schizophrenia. They change the balance of chemicals in the brain and can help control symptoms.

These medications are usually helpful, but they can cause side effects. Many side effects can be managed, and they should not prevent you from seeking treatment for this serious condition.

Common side effects from antipsychotics may include:

• Dizziness
• Feelings of restlessness or "jitters"
• Sleepiness (sedation)
• Slowed movements
• Tremor
• Weight gain

Long-term use of antipsychotic medications may increase your risk for a movement disorder called tardive dyskinesia. This condition causes repeated movements that you cannot control, especially around the mouth. Call your health care provider right away if you think you may have this condition.

When schizophrenia does not improve with several antipsychotics, the medication clozapine can be helpful. Clozapine is the most effective medication for reducing schizophrenia symptoms, but it also tends to cause more side effects than other antipsychotics.

Schizophrenia is a life-long illness. Most people with this condition need to stay on antipsychotic medication for life.

Support Programs and Therapies

Supportive therapy may be helpful for many people with schizophrenia. Behavioral techniques, such as social skills training, can be used to improve social and work functioning. Job training and relationship-building classes are important.

Family members of a person with schizophrenia should be educated about the disease and offered support. Programs that offer outreach and community support services can help people who lack family and social support.

Family members and caregivers are often encouraged to help people with schizophrenia stay with their treatment.

It is important that the person with schizophrenia learns how to:

• Take medications correctly and manage side effects
• Notice the early signs of a relapse and what to do if symptoms return
• Cope with symptoms that occur even while taking medication (a therapist can help)
• Manage money
• Use public transportation

Information provided by the NIH 

Famous People and Schizophrenia

There are relatively few famous people with schizophrenia because schizophrenia is a brain disorder that typically strikes people when they are quite young - age 17 to 28. People this age typically are too young to be famous, they are just starting out their professional lives after completing high school or college. A recent Nobel Laureate in Economics, John Forbes Nash Jr., has a lifetime history of Schizophrenia but is now doing very well, as has been well documented in the book "A Beautiful Mind" and the academy award-winning movie of the same name. Many "historical diagnoses" are frequently not entirely certain -- a "good guess" for schizophrenia includes Mary Todd Lincoln, wife of President Abraham Lincoln. Following is a list of famous people who have been diagnosed with schizophrenia, or are highly suspected of suffering (or who had suffered) from schizophrenia. Tom Harrell, Jazz Musician Meera Popkin, Broadway Star John Nash - Mathematician/Nobel Prize Winner Albert Einstein's son - Eduard Einstein Dr. James Watson's son (Dr. Watson is co-discover of DNA and Nobel Prize winner) Alan Alda's Mother (Alan Alda is the famous TV actor from the series MASH) Andy Goram - Scottish Soccer Player/Goal Keeper Lionel Aldridge - Superbowl-winning Football Player Peter Green, Guitarist for the band Fleetwood Mac Syd Barrett of the band Pink Floyd Alexander "Skip" Spence and Bob Mosley - both members of the 1960's rock group Moby Grape (and Jefferson Airplane for Skip Spence) Roger Kynard "Roky" Erickson, of the Austin-based 1960's group TheThirteenth Floor Elevators Joe Meek - 1960's British record producer James Beck Gordon (Jim Gordon) - James Gordon had been, quite simply, one of the greatest drummers of his time Charles "Buddy" Bolden - Jazz Musician Antoin Artaud - Dramatist, Artist Mary Todd Lincoln, wife of Abraham Lincoln (past-President of the United States) Vaclav Nijinsky, Famous Russian Dancer Jack Kerouac, Author, was diagnosed with Schizophrenia Tennessee Williams sister Rose Williams had schizophenia Source

Fun Facts About the Month of March

The name of March comes from ancient Rome, when March was the first month of the year and named Martius after Mars (Ares), the Greek god of war. In Rome, where the climate is Mediterranean, March was the first month of spring, a logical point for the beginning of the year as well as the start of the military campaign season. It’s one of seven months that is 31 days long.

Birthstones:    

Aquamarine - a gemstone was believed to protect sailors, as well as to guarantee a safe voyage. The serene color of aquamarine is said to cool the temper, allowing the wearer to remain calm and levelheaded.

  

Bloodstone - a dark-green jasper flecked with vivid red spots of iron oxide. This ancient stone was used by the Babylonians to make seals and amulets and was believed to have healing powers, especially for blood disorders. Sometimes called the martyr's stone as legend tells that it was created when drops of Christ's blood stained some jasper at the foot of the cross.

Birth flower: Daffodil - Cheerful yellow daffodils signal the end of winter cold and the return of warmer days. If you live in a moderate climate, daffodils are among the first flowers to bust into bloom every spring, making them a symbol of rebirth.

In the language of flowers, daffodils symbolize friendship, chivalry, respect, modesty and faithfulness. Apparently, the daffodil was originally called "affodell," a variant of asphodel. No one really knows why the letter "d" was added to the front of the name, but from at least the 1500s the flowers have been playfully known in literature as "Daffadown Dilly" or "daffadowndilly."

Daffodil is the common name for all members of the genus narcissus, and many people call daffodils narcissus. In North America, daffodils are also known as jonquils, the Spanish name for the flower. Daffodils range in size from 5-inch blooms on 2-foot stems to half-inch flowers on 2-inch stems and have a sweet fragrance.

March 1st: Ohio became 17th state (1803), Nebraska became 37th state (1867), Glenn Miller born (1904), Charles Lindbergh’s baby kidnapped (1932), President Kennedy established the Peace Corps (1961), 7 officials in the Nixon White House indicted for Watergate (1974)

March 2nd: Sam Houston born (1793), Texas declared independence from Mexico (1836)

March 3rd: Missouri Compromise passed (1820), Florida became 27th state (1845), Alexander Graham Bell born (1847)

March 4th: Vermont became 14th state (1791), President Franklin Roosevelt makes famous “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself” inaugural address (1933)

March 5th: Boston Massacre (1770), Joseph Stalin died (1953), Winston Churchill made “Iron Curtain” speech in Fulton, MO (1946)

March 6th: Michelangelo born (1475), Elizabeth Barrett Browning born (1806), Fort Alamo fell to Mexican troops (1836)

March 7th: Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone (1876)

March 9th: Amerigo Vespucci born (1451), Yuri Gagarin born (1934)

March 10th: Salvation Army founded in the US (1880), Claire Booth Luce born (1903) 

March 12th: Juliette Low founded the Girl Scouts (1912)

March 14th: Albert Einstein born (1879)

March 15th: The Ides of March (Caesar’s assassination - 44 BC)

March 17th: St. Patrick’s Day

March 19th: Dr. David Livingstone born (1813), Wyatt Earp born (1848), William Jennings Bryan born (1860) 

March 20th: Henrik Ibsen born (1828)

March 21st: Johann Sebastian Bach born (1685)

March 22nd: The ERA was passed (1972)

March 23rd: Patrick Henry ignites American Revolution with his “give me liberty or give me death!” speech (1775)

March 24th: The Philippine Islands granted independence by President Franklin Roosevelt after almost 50 years of US control (1934), Harry Houdini born (1874), Exxon Valdez oil spill (1989)

March 26th: Tennessee Williams born (1911)

March 28th: Three Mile Island nuclear accident (1979) 

March 29th: The House Select Committee on Assassinations released final report on the murders of John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, and Martin Luther King (1979)

March 30th: Vincent Van Gogh born (1853), Ronald Reagan and James Brady shot (1981)

March 31st: Daylight Savings Time goes into effect in the US (1918)

Fun Facts About Redwood City

Since we're starting to spend more time downtown, I wanted to learn a little more about our new home. Here's what I've learned about Redwood City so far...

Redwood City's Slogan

Redwood City's slogan, emblazoned on arches across Broadway at the east and west entrances to downtown, is "Climate Best By Government Test." This is based on a climatological survey conducted by the United States and German governments prior to World War I. The area centered on Redwood City tied for the world's best climate with the Canary Islands and North Africa's Mediterranean Coast.



Education in Redwood City

Sequoia High School is a high school in downtown Redwood City, California, United States. Established in 1895, it is the oldest high school in the San Francisco Bay Area between San Francisco and San Jose. It was founded as a preparatory school for Stanford University. Today, it is one of the few schools to offer the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma Programme within the Bay Area.

The present-day campus is located on the grounds of the former estate of Horace Hawes, author of the legislative bill that created San Mateo County. The grounds include a Japanese tea garden and is surrounded by a number of historical trees; the Giant Sequoia, Monkey-puzzle tree, Australian Tea tree, Ginkgo biloba trees, Cork Oak tree and many others.

Sequoia High School is part of the Sequoia Union High School District.

On September 13, 2007 Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger visited Sequoia High School to sign bill SB 33, which prohibits persons who are under the age of 18 years from using a wireless telephone or other mobile service device while operating a motor vehicle.

Law and Order in Redwood City

The Scott Peterson trial was held in Redwood City.

In 1976, Patty Hearst was held at the San Mateo County jail, as it was the most secure facility in the Bay Area at the time. Hearst, the heiress and granddaughter of the legendary newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst, was kidnapped by a radical group, the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), and made national headlines when she joined the group in a series of crimes.

Author Ken Kesey spent time in the San Mateo County jail in 1967 for possession of marijuana. During his incarceration he wrote Kesey’s Jail Journal.

In addition to the new 20-screen theatre, major improvements were made to the historical courthouse located on Broadway. In the late 30's an addition was built in front of the original structure, obscuring the view. It was torn down as part of the revitalization project. The building has been replaced with a large courtyard flanked by water fountains on either side, leading to the main steps of the courthouse. The courthouse's glass dome is lit at night and changes colors every 11 seconds.

On Location in Redwood City

Harold and Maude was filmed at various Northern California locations. There is a scene of Maude liberating a "poor tree that can't breathe" which was filmed in front of the San Mateo County Government Center in downtown.

The courthouse scenes of Mrs. Doubtfire were filmed at the Redwood City courthouse.


Famous Redwood City Residents

• Gary Beban: 1967 Heisman Trophy winner, briefly played professional football for the Washington Redskins.
• Ray Dolby: 1951 Founder of Dolby Laboratories, producer of Dolby Sound used in nearly every movie.
• Spencer Folau: 1991 Super Bowl Championship Team with the Baltimore Ravens.
• Tim Genis: 1984 Boston Symphony Lead Timpanist
• Roger Dennis "Denny" Hansen: Rhodes Scholar All American Swimmer @ Sequoia, Yale University, Subject of Calvin Trillin's Remembering Denny (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1993; the true story of a golden boy's rise and fall),
• Charles Johnson: professional basketball player for the Golden State Warriors.
• Paul McClellan: Major League Baseball (MLB) player for the San Francisco Giants.
• Gordon Moore: 1946 Co-founder of Intel Corporation, best known for Moore's Law.
• Paul Noce: former MLB player with the Chicago Cubs.
• Kenny Ortega: 1968 Emmy Award winner and Director and Choreographer for the High School Musical franchise. Longtime choreographer for Michael Jackson. Directed and choreographed the film Newsies.
• Eric Dane (in school as Eric Feldman): Former Student 1987–1990 — Actor on Grey's Anatomy and Marley & Me.
• Dick Sharon: former MLB player.
• Dick Stuart: former MLB player with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
• Bob Svihus: 1961 Played with the Oakland Raiders and the New York Jets from 1965–1973.
• Tim Twietmeyer: Ultramarathon runner, best known for his completing the Western States Endurance Run more than 25 times in under 24 hours.
• Linda Cardellini: actress born in Redwood City, best known for her roles in ER and Freaks & Geeks.

Sister cities

•  Colima, Colima, Mexico
•  Zhuhai, China
•  Annapolis, Maryland, USA
•  Aguililla, Michoacán, Mexico