Vin Scully to return for 66th season in LA in 2015

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Vin Scully is staying in the booth for the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The 86-year-old Hall of Fame announcer will return for his record 66th season with the team in 2015. The announcement was made by in Korean, Spanish and English by players Hyun-Jin Ryu, Yasiel Puig and Justin Turner on the Dodger Stadium video board in the second inning of Tuesday night's game against Atlanta.

The news was greeted with loud cheers and a prolonged standing ovation for Scully, who stood and waved to fans from his booth, where he hugged his wife, Sandi.

A decision about Scully's future has become an annual rite of passage in recent years as he evaluates his health and his family's wishes in considering whether he wants to continue.

''God willing, I will be back next year,'' he said in a statement released by the team. ''Naturally there will come a time when I have to say goodbye, but I've soul-searched and this is not the time.''

Scully's consecutive years of service make him the longest-tenured broadcaster with one team in sports history. He calls all nine innings of the team's home games and road games in California and Arizona for the Dodgers' new television home on SportsNet LA, while the first three innings of his games are simulcast on the radio.

Finally agreed to something .......

(Reuters) - Striking harbor clerks and management at the twin ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach agreed to federal mediation on Tuesday in a bid to end a week-old labor clash that has idled most of America's biggest cargo shipping complex.

The agreement to mediation, announced by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, came after an all-night bargaining session that a spokesman for the Harbor Employers Association, representing shippers and terminal operators, said had left the parties "still far apart."

But a union spokesman said the opposing sides had "made incredible progress," and he credited the mayor boat with helping contract negotiators narrow their differences.

The spokesman, Craig Merrilees of the International Longshore and Warehouse Workers Local 63, said a new round of talks would begin once the mediator arrives later in the day.

With mounting economic losses estimated at several billion dollars, the strike marks the largest cargo traffic disruption at the Southern California harbor facilities since a 10-day lockout of longshoremen at several West Coast ports in 2002.

Fifty Years Ago ................

Fifty years ago, I remember this incident, what a change has happened since then. Around this time I introduced a friend of mine, a white gal, to Billy Ward, a black entertainer, Billy Ward and the Dominos. They eventually got married. We talked much before her marriage, "What about her white daughter?" Blacks were still not allowed in the casinos .......................... fifty years ago.

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) – Fifty years ago this week, Sammy Davis Jr. was roundly booed during the opening ceremony of the 1960 Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles. The incident was one of the saddest moments in the entertainer's life and pointed up the deep racial divide that was threatening to rip apart the Democratic Party and the country.


It was July 11, 1960, and in two days the convention would nominate John F. Kennedy as the Democrats' presidential nominee. It had been hot and smoggy that day as 7,000 delegates began pouring into the Sports Arena downtown. The convention was called to order promptly at 5 p.m., and after the invocation, everyone stood as the color guard presented the flag -- the first with 50 stars presented at a national political convention as Hawaii had been admitted to the Union 11 months earlier.

Then came the introduction of the Hollywood celebrities who were packed into the crowded hall as guests of the convention. Three of the five-member Rat Pack were there: Davis, Frank Sinatra and Peter Lawford. Tony Curtis and his wife, Janet Leigh, were on hand, as was Nat "King" Cole, Shirley MacLaine, Lee Marvin, Edward G. Robinson, Hope Lange, Lloyd Bridges and Vincent Price.

Everyone was greeted with cheers except Davis, who was booed by many of the white Southern delegates -- not because he was unpopular but because he was engaged to a white woman, Swedish actress May Britt. A headline over a New York Times story the next day read, "Delegates Boo Negro."

After the booing subsided, Sinatra came over and put his hand on Davis' shoulder. "Those dirty sons of bitches," he told his pal. "Don't let 'em get to you."

But it did get to Davis. With tears welling up, he asked Sinatra: "What did I do to deserve that?"

With Davis looking on, Sinatra then sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" under a lone spotlight shining from the rafters as if from heaven. Frank's daughter Nancy later recalled that this was one of her father's "proudest moments," but when he sang the last line, it must have been a moment tinged with irony as well.

After Davis left the rostrum, a reporter, noting that Cole had not been booed when he was introduced, asked Davis why he thought so many of the Southern delegates had booed him. "You know as well as I why they booed," he said.

Another Memory

I was in the Navy, San Diego, Yeoman School, in 1952, and a classmate of mine lived in Los Angeles, and we occasionally went up to his house for a weekend visit.

His Dad was a Dentist, and as I recall, that year he was President of a Los Angeles Dental Association.

On one particular visit, his Dad was very busy putting the finishing touches on a large annual meeting the association was having that weekend. Dentists were coming in from all over California for the event. It was being held a a large convention center somewhere.

It was unusual for his family to be home during our visits, they were generally off somewhere for the weekend. He had a girlfriend who lived in Beverly Hills, her Father had something to do with one of the large studios. We visited her home on one of my visits. I remember she lived in a corner house, very large, and in close proximity to her house, some of her neighbors included Jimmy Stewart, Jack Benny and some other well known names.

We were sitting out at their pool one morning, and Dan Dailey, entered and went around saying hello to everyone, followed by Virginia Mayo and Frank Lovejoy. They were putting together a movie they were working on. It was a big event for me, a kid from Ohio, sitting around the luxurious pool, waving, and saying "Hi Dan."

That happened on Saturday morning, and the convention was that evening. The entertainment for the evening was Martin and Lewis.

Of course I didn't attend the meeting, but when his Dad got home, rather late, we were sitting up watching "The Peter Potter Show," which few will remember. He had a late Saturday night show, from LA, live, came on around midnight, and would keep going as long as guests showed up. All very impromptu. I remember one night Sammy Davis stopped by, before his accident. All the "stars" who lived in LA stopped by at one time or another. It was the first "Late Night TV Show," remember, this was in 1952.

His Dad got us tickets, for a Sunday Morning show at one of the downtown theatres in LA, The Martin and Lewis Show. If memory serves me, the show started around noon, or something like that.

Lewis came out first, a little late, apologizing to the filled theatre, explaining they had done a convention the night before that went on till the wee hours of the morning, and they had very little sleep. He clowned around a bit, then Dean Martin came out and they went through some of their normal routines. They primarily did what they felt like doing, and it was hilariously funny. I gathered they were still a bit "high" from the previous night, so the entire hour plus show was nothing but laughs. The great thing about the show, they had no idea what was coming next, they played the whole show, doing whatever they felt like doing next. It was great.

It was a great weekend, and a great show, early Martin and Lewis. Prior to that, I had listened to them on the radio when they broadcast their first "telethons," which were from some theatre in New York, with the midshipmen from Annapolis, going through the crowd collecting money .....