A pseudo-PSA from Digital Batman. For most of us in America, we recently celebrated Valentine’s Day on Friday February 14th. In fact, every February 14 is the venerated holiday celebrating love and friendship. Though some may view the celebration as a trite “Hallmark Greeting Card” holiday, lot’s of people take it quite seriously. Here are a few crazy Valentine’s Day stats for you to consider: Over $17 Billion dollars (with a B) is spent on this day Men spend twice as much money on average than women on this day (~$133 to ~$56) More than 145 Million cards are sold on this day (or just before it) Over 1/3 of all the fresh flowers in America are sold on this one day! Well over 257 Million roses are produced for Valentine’s Day Shoppers spent over $707 Million dollars on candy. Also, over 6 million people choose to get engaged to be married on this holiday. And more than 8 Billion conversation hearts are produced each year (with most purchased for this day)! It seems to me that we should have Valentine’s Day off from work because too much romance and chocolates might make us very unproductive! LOL! Anyway, Happy Valentine’s Day to all of you in Digital Gotham! Now if I can only get Digital Catwoman to stop sending me those creepy conversation hearts…
romance
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January 1, 2020Today’s Progressive Pioneer is none other than the ultra-prolific planetary romance and adventure novelist Edgar Rice Burroughs (EBR). Burroughs’ work—particularly on his John Carter of Barsoom (i.e. Mars) series—are the unsung inspiration for stories such as Flash Gordon, Star Wars, and even Avatar. All eleven Barsoom novels describe a world so rich in detail, culture, wildly eccentric science and technology (for his time), outlandish and terrifying creatures, and extraordinary complex characters story tellers have been tapping into for over a century. However, Burroughs’ work goes beyond just his Barsoom/Mars books. He is even more known for his Tarzan adventure novel series of 26 books. These stories were so famous during Burroughs’ time that he immediately saw the tech trend value in exploiting them in all forms of media (against so-called experts’ advice at the time). Tarzan became an instant hit on radio, in comic books, and in film. In fact, even Burroughs’ daughter Joan married Tarzan film actor, James Pierce, starring with her husband, as the voice of Jane, during 1932-34 for the Tarzan radio series! However, the most interesting fact about Burroughs’ Tarzan is that not one but two towns were named after the character! Tarzana in California, which started out as EBR’s eponymous ranch in the Los Angeles area, and eventually became incorporated as the American town of Tarzana in 1927. Tarzan in Texas was also formally named in 1927. There’s even an impact crater on Mars named after EBR! Burroughs was born in Chicago Illinois on September 1st, 1875 and died on March 19th, 1950 at the age of 74. He was married twice, first to Emma Hulbert (1900–1934) where they had three children together (Joan, Hulbert, and John); and then to actress Florence Gilbert Dearholt (1935–1942). He passed away in Encino California but he is laid...