Ramblin' with Roger

#1 pop hits of 1946

To Each His Own

These are the number one pop hits of 1946. Fascinatingly, of the 20 recordings, the same song went to the top by two different artists (The Gypsy and Oh! What It Seemed ) or even three artists (To Each His Own).

This is a function, in large part, because between 1944 and 1958, there were multiple charts. In 1946, it was Best Sellers, Juke Box, and Disc Jockey. That’s why there are 96(!) #1 hits that year.

The Gypsy – Ink Spots (Decca), 13 weeks at #1, gold record. Even though they came out long before I was born, I always loved the group.

Oh! What It Seemed To Be – Frankie Carle and his orchestra with Marjorie Hughes, vocals (Columbia), 11 weeks at #1. Co-written by Carle. Hughes is Carle’s daughter.

Rumors Are Flying – Frankie Carle and his orchestra, with Marjorie Hughes, vocals (Columbia), 9 weeks at #1

To Each His Own – Eddy Howard and his orchestra, vocals by Eddy Howard and trio. (Majestic), 8 weeks at #1, gold record. The song is from the film To Each His Own.

The Gypsy – Dinah Shore, orchestra under the direction of Sonny Burke (Columbia), 8 weeks at #1. I recall some of her talk shows and even some of her later variety series.

Oh! What It Seemed To Be – Frank Sinatra, orchestra under the direction of Axel Stordahl (Columbia), 8 weeks at #1

The Old Lamp-Lighter – Sing and Sway with Sammy Kaye with Billy Williams and choir (RCA Victor), 7 weeks at #1

(I Love You) For Sentimental Reasons -the King Cold Trio (Capitol), 6 weeks at #1

Winter hit

Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow! – Vaughn Monroe and his orchestra, vocal by Vaughn Monroe and The Norton Sisters (Victor), 5 weeks at #1. Written by Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne. This didn’t chart until 12/22/1945 and peaked on 1/19/1946. So this was a real winter, rather than a Christmas song

Five Minutes More – Frank Sinatra, orchestra under the direction of Axel Stordahl (Columbia), 4 weeks at #1

Prisoner of Love – Perry Como with Russ Case and his Orchestra (RCA Victor), 3 weeks at #1, gold record. He had a musical variety show from 1948 to 1963, which I vaguely recall

To Each His Own -Freddy Martin and his orchestra, with Stuart Wade, vocals (RCA Victor), 2 weeks at #1, inspired by the Paramount picture, To Each His Own

Personality – Johnny Mercer and the Pied Pipers, with Paul Weston and his orchestra (Capitol), 2 weeks at #1. “Dorothy Lamour introduced on-screen this great Johnny Burke-Jimmy Van Heusen song in the Hope-Crosby film ‘Road To Utopia.'”

Symphony – Freddy Martin and his orchestra, with Clyde Rogers, vocals (Victor), 2 weeks at #1

Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief – Betty Hutton, orchestra and vocal quartet conducted by Paul Weston (Capitol ), 2 weeks at #1. Here’s Betty Hutton performing the musical number from the 1945 Paramount movie “The Stork Club”.

Ole Buttermilk Sky – Kay Kyser and his orchestra, with Michael Douglas and the Campus Kids (Columbia), 2 weeks at #1, song from “Canyon Passage.” Michael Douglas later became TV host Mike Douglas, whom I would watch occasionally

These are all one week at number one

Surrender – Perry Como, with Russ Case and his orchestra (RCA Victor)

To Each His Own -Ink Spots (Decca ), gold record. Song written by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans

I’m A Big Girl Now – Swing and Sway with Sammy Kaye with Betty Barclay, vocals (RCA Victor)

White Christmas – Bing Crosby with Ken Darby Singers and John Scott Trotter and his orchestra (Decca), a holiday Song. This is the 1942 version, the last year it charted before it was supplanted by the 1947 take. The Irving Berlin composition from 1942 was the eighth-most-recorded song between 1890 and 1954.

April rambling; alternative world order

Sid Krofft

Amnesty International’s annual report on human rights around the globe described a push for a “predatory alternative world order.”

His Erratic Behavior and Extreme Comments Revive Mental Health Debate

The Most Ludicrous, Morally Obscene, and Dangerous Man in the World

The deaf, dumb, and blind cult is still dazzled by the nastiest, most naked ‘emperor’ ever, and Jordan Klepper Gets MAGA’s Take on the Iran War & the War with the Pope | The Daily Show

‘Anytime you engage the Border Patrol in interior enforcement, the wheels are going to fall off.’

Google Broke Its Promise to Me. Now ICE Has My Data.

The insider trading suspicions looming over this regime

Flu vaccine no longer mandated for US troops, Hegseth says, citing “medical autonomy” and religious freedom.

When Ezekiel 25:17 Meets Psalms 3:16

The Pentagon doesn’t want you to hear about threats to the editorial independence of Stars and Stripes. They fired their ombudsperson.

He Wrote an Op-Ed. Then the police tracked him. A legal case in Kansas shows how surveillance technology can distort policing priorities. When authorities can monitor anyone cheaply, the temptation to target critics increases.

Jimmy Kimmel Provides an Alternative White House Correspondents’ Dinner Roast

AfA

Astronauts for America is a nonpartisan organization of former NASA astronauts who have sworn to defend the Constitution of the United States, committed to science, evidence-based decision-making, public service, and the rule of law.

Measles Took My Daughter. This Is What I Want Everyone to Know.

The Death of a Superman. How clothing donation bins quietly kill homeless people across North America.

988 Launch Tied to Drop in Youth Suicides

The Short and Ridiculous Trial of a Protester Arrested in an Inflatable Penis Costume. An Alabama cop who confronted the No Kings protester claimed she posed a risk to public safety.

The product liability legal case of the century arrives this summer: Coyote vs. Acme, the movie

Gerry Conway, Former Marvel EIC, Dies at 73. The first Spider-Man comic I read was the Death of Gwen Stacy, which he wrote, among MANY other pieces for Marvel and DC. He also wrote for television, including Diagnosis: Murder and, my favorite of his, Law & Order: Criminal Intent.

Sid Krofft: About and Memories, and H.R. Pufnstuf, Witchiepoo, Joy the Bugaloo, and me

Marvel Confirms 2019 ‘Avengers: Endgame’ To Be Replaced Before ‘Doomsday’ Released- a good reason to give up on the MCU, IMO

William Shatner is selling Kellogg’s Raisin Bran

“Your settlement payment of $9 for the In re EpiPen Marketing, Sales Practices and Antitrust Litigation, Civil Case No. 2:17-md-02785-DDC-TJJ is now available.” I’m rich!

Crease and Desist and The Cat Phone Came Back and The Crime of Borrowing a Teenage Witch? and The Good Advice That The DMV Rejected

MUSIC

Antichrist Superstar from Colbert

Aeolian Beauty by RZA · Colorado Symphony · Christopher Dragon

Goodbye Henry – RAYE, feat. Al Green

Solsbury Hill -MonaLisa Twins

Gladys Knight’s title tune for 1989’s Bond movie Licence To Kill

Meaning Business – Wendy Eisenberg

Musician Dave Mason, who was a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Traffic, died at the age of 79

Coverville 1577: 50th Anniversary of Ramones and 1578: Dave Mason Tribute and Paul Carrack Cover Story

Favorite Songs By Favorite Artists (Series Four) #1: HOUSE Of ALL

Angel Of The Morning – Merrilee Rush

Kiss – Prince

April 23

Medicare Advantage

Occasionally, I’ll do a day in the life. I picked April 23 because it was SO all over the place emotionally.

Even when I woke up a few hours after going to bed, it felt weird. I looked at the clock radio, and it was flashing. This meant the power went off, but came on about half an hour ago.

That tracks with the email I got at 12:28 a.m, but did not see until morning. “Dear National Grid Customer,

We detected power outages near [address]. There are currently 1713 other customers also associated with this outage. We are investigating and will provide updates around progress when we get more information. If you are without power, please let us know by reporting it on our website.”

Well, I didn’t get more info, but didn’t need any.

So in the morning, we had to do what we usually do when the clocks change twice a year. The computer clocks are correct, as is the battery-powered analog clock in the kitchen. I have to change the clocks on the stove and microwave.

But much to my surprise, I didn’t have to change the plugged-in “8-inch large clock with day and date for the elderly.” We had purchased it for my MIL for Christmas in 2024, but she didn’t like it. Conversely, I LOVE this thing. Knowing the day, and especially the date, has been a lift ever since I retired.

A certain ‘tude

I was listening to the boom box in my office, but something sounded off. I thought the machine was squealing. No, it was the sound of a bird chirping outside my window! I didn’t see it, but it made me happy.

Eventually, I’m about to take the bus downtown. I wait a few seconds to see if anyone is getting off. I got on, scanned my card, and this dude was just standing there waiting for me to get off the bus so he could get off. What? Someone said, “Next time, you should just USE that cane” that I was carrying. The implication was clear. That seemed extreme.

Then I walked to the next bus. As I walked past a shop, I saw a guy trying to hustle a merchant. The storekeeper said to the other guy, “Let me do you a favor. Get out of my face in the next ten seconds, and I won’t have to give you a lecture.” A “lecture” clearly suggested a thrashing.

What weird energy.

A little more conversation

I get to my doctor’s office early, so I text my daughter to ask if I can call her. (That’s the current protocol, right?) I share that her grandma had been in the hospital briefly, but is now rehabilitating.

She told me that a couple of women at UMass in Amherst were assaulted recently, the latter killed. She found it understandably unsettling, as she goes to that campus periodically, including that day. As it turns out, the woman killed was the wife of the alleged assailant.

I go into the doctor’s office. To get reimbursed for the payment that’s due, I need an itemized statement from the office, which isn’t generated automatically. I suggest printing the bill (which I probably have SOMEWHERE at home), and that does the trick. The receptionist suggests I could do her job, and this becomes her running joke when I later make a new appointment.

Meanwhile, a couple of patients are in the waiting room, railing about Medicare Advantage. I am very interested in the topic, since it will soon involve choices my wife will have to make. One said to “go online,” which I always consider a non-answer. (Still, read this and watch John Oliver.)

The other guy thought it was too limiting and was relieved to get out of his plan, only because his provider had discontinued MA and wanted to put him in a PPO. My doc later said that the MAs are mining patient data and overcharging the government.

The medical aide, who was wearing a New England Patriots sweatshirt but who was otherwise very nice, engaged in some NFL banter with me. She: “You had five years (for the Bills to win the Super Bowl).” Me “Go, Seahawks! “(who beat the Pats in the last Super Bowl.) And “18-1” (Pats were undefeated when they lost the SB to the Giants in the 2007/08 season.) Fun stuff!

Old friend

I got on the bus back to downtown when I saw an old friend. We used to ride the bus together when we both worked in Corporate (frickin’) Woods. She recently retired from her job in insurance; she got a very part-time job at the office of one of her doctors. I don’t think we have seen each other since COVID, which we will rectify.

I went home, took out the trash, and had a quick dinner.

sigh

Taking the 114 bus, I walked north on Willett Street. These two women and their two children were walking south. They must have passed me. A young (20ish?) woman was across the street, in Washington Park, walking in the same direction but slightly behind them, screaming a xenophobic, profanity-laden litany. I stopped and watched her for about four minutes. If she had wanted to get closer to them, she could have. They all got to the corner, turned left, and were out of my sight. I still wonder if I had interceded, if it would have helped or harmed the situation.

I went to choir, and afterward got a ride home.

It was a very rollercoaster kind of day.

Earthword Comics combines ICE incident, FCBD

raising funds for the West Hill Refugee Welcome Center

A story in the Sunday, April 26 Times Union newspaper reminded me that Free Comic Book Day is coming up on Saturday, May 2. As a former comic store employee and a former collector long before that, it’s my way to check in.

And I always go to Earthworld Comics at 537 Central Avenue, near Manning Blvd. Earthworld was started a few years after FantaCo’s 1978 opening, but we were very civil competitors. When I would come into the store for FCBD in the 2010s and early 2020s, J.C. Glindmyer, the original owner, would treat me like royalty, which was both weird and very sweet. I was sad when he died in 2023.

His son Nick Glindmyer, who now owns the store, is doing something special for FCBD this year, tied to an ICE incident. “According to a notice posted to Facebook by the Capital Region Sanctuary Coalition, which monitors ICE activity in the region, a pair of ICE vehicles surrounded a car in front of Albany Strength Gym, next door to Earthworld, around 8:17 a.m. on March 19. ICE agents then approached the car, and an individual who was inside the car was detained. A photo accompanying the notice shows at least two agents — one wearing an olive ‘Police’ tactical vest — interacting with a car outside the gym’s front window.

“So we thought, ‘How can we use our platform with Free Comic Book Day to help those that might need help?’ He decided to turn the centerpiece of the shop’s biggest day of the year… into a fundraiser for another Albany neighbor, the West Hill Refugee Welcome Center.”

Headlocked Comics

“Glindmyer said the shop will have $20 tote bags for sale on Free Comic Book Day… featuring the cover image from a comic written by Clifton Park-based creator Michael Kingston, owner of Headlocked Comics, a wrestling-oriented comics publisher. Created by artist Michel Mulipola, the image features a hulking, masked figure based on professional wrestler Brody King, wearing a costume with “Abolish ICE” across the chest. All revenue from sales of the bag will go to the West Hill refugee assistance programs.

“Locally based comic artist John Hebert, who has illustrated a long list of Marvel Comics’ series over the years, will also create an original piece of art for the event that will be auctioned off to benefit the WHRWC. Hebert will be in attendance at Earthworld throughout Free Comic Book Day.” I helped work on a comic book for FantaCo, Sold Out, with John Hebert many moons ago.

Hampshire College is closing

Five College Consortium becomes Four

The fact that Hampshire College is closing is not a shock. But it is a disappointment.

I remember the dark and rainy morning in July 2021 when our family first visited the Amherst campus. We had been staying at a timeshare in western Massachusetts. My wife decided that the Daughter needed to start at least looking at colleges.

So we left at 8 a.m. (!) on a Saturday (!) to travel for 90 minutes on a bunch of back roads to this campus, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. Even with the precipitation outside and the windows up, as we approached, I could smell the farmland, if you know what I mean.

Initially, I figured there was no way my kid was going to go here. But after a number of sessions, some with parents but most without, she was at least somewhat interested.

The rest of the summer and into the autumn, our daughter, with one or both parents, visited at least a dozen colleges. If I were a betting man, I would have wagered on her going to Hofstra, which she saw with me a couple of months later.

Our daughter had a very systematic, color-coded system in which she weighed a variety of factors (curriculum, distance, price, accessibility), and before her last high school semester, she was focused on Hampshire.

Money problems?

At some point after she had been accepted but before classes began in 2022, the family was there. Some rumors about Hampshire’s financial viability were swirling. (Indeed, a guy from our church thought the school had already closed.) My wife spoke with someone from the college – I remember we were in a cafeteria – and she felt reassured.

We had packed up the car in late August when my daughter was feeling a bit off. She took a COVID test and tested positive. In due course, I and then my wife also presented. So instead of getting there a week early and participating in the orientation rituals, we arrived on Labor Day, three days after classes began.

I don’t know if it was the late start or going through the last half of high school in COVID-related mode, but the start was a bit rough, not just scholastically, but socially. However, she eventually found her rhythm.

It helped when she started taking classes at a couple of the other schools in the Five College Consortium, which also includes the University of
Massachusetts Amherst, Smith, Mount Holyoke, and Amherst. She learned to navigate the Pioneer Valley Transit Authority system before getting a car for her final year.

The news

We were all in the afterglow of her wonderful art show when we got The E-Mail from college president Jenn Chrisler, plus the chair and chair-elect of the board. “Seven years ago, the Hampshire community presented the College with a powerful mandate: to maintain independence and remain true to Hampshire’s deepest-held values. Since then, we have all worked together toward those goals…

“Despite this herculean effort, the financial pressures on the College’s operations have become increasingly complex, compounded by shifting external factors… We worked aggressively to increase enrollment, refinance existing debt, and realize new revenue via the sale of a portion of our land… We are faced with the clear, heartbreaking reality that progress on each of these three key factors has fallen far short of what we had hoped.

“As a result, the Board of Trustees voted to permanently close Hampshire College following the Fall 2026 semester.”

The good news is that the Daughter will have graduated by then. But as someone whose K-9 school, Daniel Dickinson in Binghamton, was razed, she’s already feeling sad about the change.

The Globe

There are some interesting takes on this situation. (Some are behind paywalls.)

What is the Five College Area with only Four Colleges? Hampshire College’s upcoming closure poses an existential question. By Brooke Hauser, Boston Globe, April 20, 2026.

“Especially for Hampshire alums who still live in the area, the idea of their alma mater falling off the map is disorienting. “It’s a little bit like, ‘Oh, you were from that village on the river, but it got washed away in the flood,’” said Jordi Herold, who founded Northampton’s legendary Iron Horse Music Hall in 1979, four years after graduation. “You have your memories, but it’s not there anymore.”

Hampshire Announced It’s Closing. Will Other Small Colleges Follow? by Lee Gardner, the Chronicle of Higher Education, April 14, 2026

The loss of Hampshire is a loss for the higher-education ecosystem, said Marjorie Hass, president of the Council of Independent Colleges. “Losing even small colleges diminishes the power of our sector as a whole,” she said. The consequences for the sector, she added, are that it will become “more homogeneous, with fewer choices for students, and less diverse in terms of location and kinds of students served.”

NYT

Hampshire College Will Close Amid Student Enrollment Declines – Other small private colleges like Hampshire have closed in recent years as financial pressures and competition for students increase. By Mark Arsenault, New York Times (gift link), April 14, 2026..

“Hampshire is the alma mater of the filmmaker Ken Burns, who made his first documentary movie as a student there. ‘This is an extraordinary loss for those of us who went there,’ Mr. Burns, who graduated from Hampshire in 1975, said in an interview… The school, known for experimentation in classes and methods, offered ‘sort of medieval guild-like tutors and apprenticeships,’ he said.”

Other notable alumni include actors Lupita Nyong’o and Liev Schreiber.

As noted, the Daughter will soon be a proud graduate of Hampshire College. But it’s a situation that has made not only the Daughter but her parents surprisingly melancholy.