October 7, 1960: The film Spartacus premieres, a dramatization of the story of the Thracian gladiator who led a slave revolt in Rome in 71 BC. The film was based on the 1951 novel by Howard Fast, was directed by Stanley Kubrick, and was written by Dalton Trumbo, one of the Hollywood Ten. All were selected by the film's star, Kirk Douglas, who wanted to break the Hollywood Blacklist for once and for all. He did.
Among the film's other stars: Jean Simmons, Laurence Olivier, Charles Laughton, Peter Ustinov, Tony Curtis, Nina Foch, John Ireland, Herbert Lom, John Hoyt, and Woody Strode, who had previously broken a different barrier: He was 1 of the 4 black players who broke professional football's color barrier in 1946, before becoming an actor, working mainly in Westerns.
The film is best remembered for a scene near the end, where the Roman commander Crassus (Olivier), having surrounded Spartacus' army, offers a pardon (and return to enslavement) if the men will identify Spartacus, living or dead. But this would mean a return to slavery, and they would rather die. So every surviving man responds by shouting "I'm Spartacus!" (Most people trying to quote the movie get that wrong, saying, "I am Spartacus!")
History suggests that Spartacus died in battle, and no marriage or children have been ascribed to him. The film shows the character crucified, but living long enough for his wife to show him his infant son.
In modern times, Spartacus became an icon for the Communist movement. The most popular sports team in the Soviet Union was the soccer team run by Spartak Moscow, ironically because it turned the Spartacus ideal back on the Communist government, and became "the people's team." It remains the most popular sports team in the Russian Federation. Many other teams in former Soviet countries have the Spartak name.
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Also on this day, Route 66 premieres on CBS. It stars Martin Milner as Tod Stiles, and George Maharis as Buz Murdock, who travel around the country in a Chevrolet Corvette convertible, helping people wherever they can, because they were no longer needed or wanted where they were.
Maharis (left) and Milner
Tod grew up rich in Rye, Westchester County, New York, the son of a wealthy businessman. When his father died, he learned that his father's company was virtually bankrupt. The only thing his father had to leave him was the Corvette.
In contrast, Buz was a working-class orphan, who worked for the eldery Mr. Stiles in a New York shipyard. He talked Tod into going around the country together in the 'Vette.
U.S. Route 66 was commissioned in 1926. It started on Chicago's Loop, went down through Illinois, crossed the Mississippi River into St. Louis, went southwest across Missouri, briefly across the southeastern corner of Kansas, into Oklahoma through Tulsa to Oklahoma City. Then, it turned west, crossed the Texas Panhandle, and went through New Mexico, Arizona and California, including Los Angeles, before terminating at the Santa Monica Pier.
The federal government decommissioned the highway in 1985, as it had been mostly replaced by Interstate highways that bypassed some of the smaller towns along the route: I-55 in Illinois, I-44 from St. Louis to Oklahoma City, I-40 from there to Barstow, California, and I-15 and I-10 in California. Nevertheless, many of those small towns still call the remaining street "Route 66." For many of those towns, it served as their Main Street, and the road is still remembered as "America's Main Street."
But the show didn't exclusively stick to 66: Many of its adventures took place further east, even showing Tod and Buz working with lobstermen in Maine, and the series finale took place in Florida.
Maharis came down with hepatitis, and decided to leave the show to focus on his health, saying, "Even if you have $4 million in the bank, you can't buy another liver." This soon proved to be incorrect, as liver transplants were becoming more common.
So, late in the show's 3rd season, with no explanation for what happened to Buz, Tod encountered Lincoln Case, played by Glenn Corbett. (Star Trek fans will recognize his name, as the first actor to play warp-drive inventor Zefram Cochrane.) "Linc" was a former U.S. Army Ranger and prisoner of war in Vietnam. This episode aired on March 22, 1963, so it was the 1st TV series featuring a character who was a Vietnam War veteran, and the earliest pop-culture representation of a Vietnam vet with post-traumatic stress disorder. After a difficult opening encounter, Tod invited Linc to join him on his travels.
Route 66 may have been the 1st regular TV series to have a planned series finale: On March 20, 1964, with the action in Tampa, far from the actual highway for which the show was named, Tod met Margo Tiffin, a commodities trader from Houston, played by Barbara Eden. They got married, and, since Linc was also from Texas, that's where Tod and Linc both ended up.
This show inspired many imitators, including The Fugitive and Run For Your Life in the 1960s, The Incredible Hulk in the 1970s, and Knight Rider and Hot Pursuit in the 1980s.
Despite having to leave the show due to illness, Maharis recovered. As of October 7, 2022, he is still alive, age 93. Milner died in 2015, Corbett in 1993. (UPDATE: Maharis died on May 24, 2023.)
In 1993, NBC tried a reboot, starring James Wilder as Nick Lewis, whose estranged father has recently died. It turns out, his father was Buz Murdock, who left him the Corvette, which suggests that Tod gave it to him at some point between 1964 and 1993. He then picks up Dan Cortese as hitchhiker Arthur Clark, and they start off on their own adventures together. But not many: Fans of the original series hated it, especially the suggestion that the orphaned Buz would gain and then abandon a family; and viewers not old enough to remember the original series didn't like it, either. Only 4 episodes aired.
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October 7, 1960 was a Friday. So there was neither collegiate nor professional football played. The World Series was in a travel day. The NBA season hadn't started yet. And, while the NHL season had, 2 days earlier, no games were played on this day.
But there was one score, in the Canadian Football League: The Toronto Argonauts beat the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, 24-14 at Varsity Stadium in Toronto.
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