I Can’t Help Myself

Hello there and wel­come to the Jan­u­ary 29th edi­tion of Hangin’ in the Ham­mer; where we make each and every day a lit­tle like Canada Day (com­plete with a com­pli­men­tary day off today!)

It’s nice you have you come by on this Sun­day morn­ing as we do our daily duties seek­ing out the inter­est­ing sto­ries about some of the peo­ple and events from Cana­dian his­tory, sports and enter­tain­ment related to the day’s date.

We’re all a lit­tle out of sorts because today has no foot­ball after all those long months and in the vac­uum cre­ated by the foot­ball hia­tus, the NHL decides to put on a soft­ball week­end with the oh-so-exciting All-Star game.

Almost reduces us to call­ing up friends to see if they need help watch­ing their paint dry.

And now in an attempt to breathe some life into your day, we present our chief spokesper­son Gordie, with all of today’s fan­tas­tic facts.

On this day in 1820, after suf­fer­ing through years of men­tal ill­ness, King George III of Eng­land died and was suc­ceeded on the throne by his son George IV, who had been rul­ing in all but name since 1810.

Born on this day in 1894, in Waite Town­ship, Maine, William Henry Met­calf, who made his way to Canada in 1914 and joined the Cana­dian Expe­di­tionary Force. As a mem­ber of the 16th Btn (Cana­dian Scot­tish), Met­calf earned Mil­i­tary Medal dur­ing the Bat­tle of the Somme in 1916 and on Sep­tem­ber 2, 1918, he was one of seven mem­bers of the CEF to be awarded a Vic­to­ria Cross for his actions in bat­tle. Dur­ing the fight­ing near Arras, Cor­po­ral Met­calf, took mat­ters into his own hands and per­son­ally led a tank on an assault of a Ger­man strong­point that was hold­ing up the Cana­dian advance, revers­ing the course of bat­tle. William Henry Met­calf VC, returned home to Maine after the war and where he lived until his death in 1968. (The 16th Cana­dian Infantry Bat­tal­ion was orga­nized at Val­cartier under Camp Order 241 of 2 Sep­tem­ber 1914 and was com­posed of recruits from Vic­to­ria, Van­cou­ver, Win­nipeg and Hamilton.)

On this day in 1897, in Ottawa, Ish­bel Hamilton-Gordon, Lady Aberdeen, wife of the Gov­er­nor Gen­eral of Canada, helps to found the Vic­to­rian Order of Nurses at the request of the National Coun­cil of Women.  (The NCW was co-founded by Hamil­ton­ian Ade­laide Hood­less.)

On this day in 1946, the end comes for Cana­dian leg­end Bluenose when it finally sinks after strik­ing a reef off Haiti. Orig­i­nally built in 1921, in Lunen­burg NS, by Smith and Rhu­lan­dat, she was the fastest ship of her time and she is remem­bered fondly, on the face on the Cana­dian dime.

On this day in 1973, the Cana­dian Ambas­sador to South Viet­nam Michel Gau­vin led the first 130 mem­bers of the pro­jected Cana­dian com­ple­ment of 230 in the ICCS on arrival at Saigon.

From the world of sports, it was on this day in 1964, that the Cana­dian team attends the open­ing of the ninth Win­ter Olympic games in Inns­bruck, Aus­tria.  Canada sent 55 ath­letes, who came back home with a total of three medals.

Some other notable Cana­di­ans who were born on this date include E.P. Tay­lor, who was the owner of Cana­dian horse rac­ing leg­end, North­ern Dancer; a goalie from the Cana­dian 1968 bronze medal hockey team, Wayne Stephen­son (also part of the 1975 Cup-winning Philly Fly­ers); a mem­ber of the Leafs famed Kid Line and a HHoF inductee, Joe Primeau; Alexan­dre Barre, who won a sil­ver and a bronze in canoe­ing in 1984; for­mer NHL goalie Sean Burke, who was also part of Canada’s 1992 sil­ver medal hockey team; Karen Fonteyne, who struck sil­ver in 1996 in syn­chro­nized swim­ming; This Hour Has 22 Min­utes come­dian Shaun Majumder; actor Marc Singer aka The Beast Mas­ter; a mem­ber of the 1976 Memo­r­ial Cup win­ning Hamil­ton Fin­cups, Joe Con­tini; a win­ner of four Stan­ley Cups as a mem­ber of the Habs, Doug Rise­brough; a win­ner of a gold, sil­ver and bronze in canoe­ing, Adam Van Koever­den and Hamilton’s own Olympic gold medal­ist, Pat Quinn (coach of the 2002 Olympic team.)

Today’s Juno Moldy Oldy, Long, Long Way comes from another local notable, Ian Thomas.

Born on this day in 1952, the last remain­ing orig­i­nal Ramone, Tommy which prompted us to ask, when was the last time you heard, I Wanna Be Sedated? (NYC is just two days away!)

Today’s musi­cal title, I Can’t Help Myself, was inspired in part by James Lee Jamer­son, born on this day in 1936. James was a ses­sion man in Motown who laid down some pretty heavy bass for more than 20 num­ber one hits.

And at this point my list has reached its end and so I must once more depart. Adieu.

Yup, in case it wasn’t clear before, Hamil­ton is the true cen­tre of the uni­verse; sorry Hogtown.

It was nice hav­ing you come by and share a cup or two with us and now we’ll be headed on our way to start­ing work­ing on tomorrow’s entry. We’ll see you then.

Have fun and be safe.

Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch…