July 28, 1954: "On the Waterfront" Premieres

Eva Marie Saint (left) and Marlon Brando

July 28, 1954: On the Waterfront premieres, directed by Elia Kazan. It is regarded as one of the greatest movies ever made.

The film is widely considered to be Kazan's answer to those who criticized him for identifying 8 Communists in the film industry before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) in 1952. Budd Schulberg, who had previously written about boxers (and would again), wrote the script, after Kazan's friend, playwright Arthur Miller, backed out. Leonard Bernstein composed the musical score.

Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando) was a former boxer, who never made it, because his brother Charley (Rod Steiger), desperate for cash, made a deal with a corrupt union leader, Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb), who strong-armed Terry into throwing a fight. In a famous scene in the back of a taxicab, Terry tells Charley, "You don't understand! I coulda had class! I coulda been a contender! I coulda been somebody! Instead of a bum, which is what I am. Let's face it."

(When people do impressions of Brando, they have multiple choices. It's often this scene. But they also do Stanley Kowalski yelling, "Stella!" from A Streetcar Named Desire; Colonel Kurtz's last words, "The horror... " from Apocalypse Now; and and various quotes from Don Vito Corleone in The Godfather.)

In saying this, Terry, now a poor longshoreman on the docks of Hoboken, New Jersey, across the Hudson River from Manhattan, tells Charley that he's going to testify against Friendly before the Waterfront Crime Commission. This is in revenge for Friendly having coerced him into luring Joey Doyle, a fellow dockworker, onto a rooftop, where Friendly's thugs pushed him to his death for testifying.

Terry had been dating Joey's sister Edie (Eva Marie Saint, in her 1st film role). She talks a local priest, Father Barry (Karl Malden), into rallying the dockworkers against Friendly. But they are more afraid of Friendly than than they are of God, and refuse. That fear grows the next day, when another boxer-turned-dockworker "owned" by Friendly, Timothy "Kayo" Dugan, testifies behind closed doors, in an attempt to keep his identity hidden, but it gets out, and he is killed.

Terry is subpoenaed, and Friendly sends Charley to tell him not to testify, leading to the conversation in the cab. Having failed in his mission, Charley is killed by Friendly, and left on a hook for Terry to see, as one final warning not to testify, meaning, if he does, he will be the next to go.

My mother told me her parents took her to see this movie, because they wanted to see it and they couldn't get a babysitter. She was 7 years old, and she said the sight of Charley on the hook traumatized her. I was 17 when I first saw it, and I can understand why.

The murder has the opposite effect on Terry: He is more determined than ever, and he does testify. The next day, He appears at the dock for the daily ritual where workers are chosen from the assembled longshoremen. Everyone is called to work except Terry, who taunts Friendly outside the nearby shack, shouting that he is proud of testifying. They get into a shouting match, and start fighting. Terry is winning until Friendly's thugs beat the hell out of him, leaving him all but dead.

Finally, the other dockworkers get it: They tell Friendly that they're on strike until Terry goes back to work. In his condition, he can't. Father Barry tells him that he lost the battle, but has a chance to win the war if he can walk into the warehouse. Father Barry and Edie get him on his feet, and he stumbles up the gangway to stand before the warehouse, where the boss nods to Terry, letting him in, and tells them to get to work. The men follow Terry inside, ignoring Friendly. Friendly threatens them all, but it's over: Even his thugs are no longer afraid of him, so his power is gone, and he is completely ignored.

Tony Galento, Tami Mauriello and Abe Simon, all of whom had fought Joe Louis for the Heavyweight Championship of the World, played dockworkers in this film. Fred Gwynne, later to star on The Munsters, played dockworker Mladen "Slim" Sekulovich. Mladen Sekulovich was Karl Malden's real name.

(Malden would also play the warden in The Birdman of Alcatraz, and "Sekulovich" was one of the names he rattled off in solitary confinement along with Burt Lancaster's Robert Stroud, the titular birdkeeper.)

The film was nominated for 12 Academy Awards. It won 8, including Best Picture, Best Actor for Brando, Best Supporting Actress for Saint, and Best Director for Kazan. Saint did not attend the award ceremony: She was pregnant, and her son Darrell Hayden was born 2 days later. Eva and director Jeffrey Hayden had one of the longest marriages in Hollywood history, marrying in 1951, and were still married when he died in 2016. In addition to Darrell, they later had a daughter, Laurette.

In 1999, Malden played a priest on an episode of The West Wing. Onto their Oval Office set, he brought the same Bible he'd used in On the Waterfront.

Cobb died in 1976, Bernstein in 1990, Steiger in 2002, Kazan in 2003, Brando in 2004, Malden and Schulberg in 2009. As of July 28, 2022, Saint is still alive, the last surviving actor from the film.

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July 28, 1954 was a Wednesday. Hugo Chávez, dictatorial President of Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013, was born on this day.

And these baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees beat the Chicago White Sox, 7-5 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Mickey Mantle went 3-for-5 with a home run and 3 RBIs. Yogi Berra went 4-for-5 with an RBI. Still, Eddie Lopat only lasted 1 inning, and the Yankees trailed 5-1 after 7 innings, before coming from behind, scoring 3 runs in the 8th and 3 more in the 9th. Bob Grim was the winning pitcher in relief.

* The New York Giants beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 10-0 at the Polo Grounds. Johnny Antonelli allowed 10 hits, but only 1 walk, and kept the shutout. Dusty Rhodes hit 3 home runs. Willie Mays added 1.

* The Brooklyn Dodgers beat the Chicago Cubs, 3-1 at Ebbets Field. Roy Campanella hit a home run. Jackie Robinson went 0-for-3, but drove in a run with a bases-loaded walk. The only Cub run came on a home run by Ralph Kiner. Rookie Ernie Banks went 0-for-4.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Cincinnati Redlegs, 3-2 at Connie Mack Stadium. (That ballpark had been Shibe Park until the year before. The Reds called themselves the Redlegs from 1953 to 1958, because of the Red Scare.)

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Washington Senators, 2-1 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore.

* The Milwaukee Braves beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 6-4 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Rookie Hank Aaron went 3-for-5 with 3 RBIs, although he did not hit a home run.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Boston Red Sox, 2-1 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Early Wynn was the winning pithcer. Ted Williams went 2-for-4 with an RBI.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Philadelphia Athletics, 10-2 at Briggs Stadium (renamed Tiger Stadium in 1961) in Detroit. Bud Souchock hit 2 home runs, and Al Kaline went 1-for-4.

June 30, 1900: The Hoboken Docks Fire

June 30, 1900: A fire breaks out on piers owned by Norddeutscher Lloyd (NDL), a German shipping company, on the Hudson River in Hoboken, New Jersey. It kills at least 326 people.

The fire began when cotton bales stored on NDL's southernmost wharf caught fire, and winds carried the flames to nearby barrels of volatile liquids, such as turpentine and oil, which exploded in rapid succession. It burned NDL's Hoboken piers to the waterline, consumed or gutted nearby warehouses, gutted 3 of NDL's major transatlantic liners, and damaged or destroyed nearly two dozen smaller craft. Most of the victims were seamen and other workers, but included women visiting one of the ships.

The piers were at the foot of 3rd and 4th Streets, across the Hudson from West 12th Street in Manhattan, New York City. Pier C Park is on the site today. This is 5 blocks north of where the Hoboken Terminal of the Erie-Lackawanna Railroad was built in 1907, now serving New Jersey Transit and the Port Authority Trans-Hudson (PATH) system. 

NDL survived World War I, and barely survived World War II, with one remaining ship. It rebuilt, restored its place in international commerce, and merged with the Hamburg America Line (HAPAG) in 1970, forming Hapag-Lloyd AG.

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June 30, 1900 was a Saturday. These games were played in baseball's National League:

* The New York Giants lost to the St. Louis Cardinals, 8-1 at League Park (later renamed Robison Field) in St. Louis.

* The Brooklyn Superbas lost to the Chicago Orphans, 8-1 at West Side Park in Chicago. The Superbas were managed by Ned Hanlon, and were named after a popular circus troupe of the era, Hanlon's Superbas. They were renamed the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1911. The Reds played in several ballparks on the site of League Park from 1884 to 1970, the last of these being Crosley Field, starting in 1912.

The Chicago team, formerly known as the White Stockings and, for their youth, as the Colts, had long been led by 1st baseman and manager Adrian Constantine Anson. He was known as "Cap," for "Captain," until he got older, and became known as "Pop." He retired after the 1897 season, and the team became known as the "Orphans," because "they missed their Pop." They were renamed the Chicago Cubs in 1903.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 5-3 at Exposition Park in Pittsburgh.

* And the Cincinnati Reds beat the Boston Beaneaters, 4-0 at League Park in Cincinnati. The Beaneaters went through a few name changed before becoming the Boston Braves in 1912.

May 16, 1964: The Submarine Sandwich Revolution

The original Blimpie store in Hoboken

May 16, 1964: The 1st Blimpie store opens, at 110 Washington Street in Hoboken, Hudson County, New Jersey, across the Hudson River from New York City.

The founders were Tony Conza, Peter DeCarlo, and Angelo Bandassare, former high school buddies and classmates at St. Peter's Prep in Jersey City, and they were inspired by Jersey Mike's in their favorite Shore town, Point Pleasant Beach in Ocean County.

The concept was, basically, a salad sandwich, with things like lettuce, tomatoes and cucumber slices, but with meat. Cold cuts: Ham, salami, roast beef, turkey, things like that, and sometimes combinations thereof. And cheese.

Conza didn't want to call the sandwiches "submarines" or "subs," thinking it sounded dirty. That was partly the fault of Murray "the K" Kaufman, one of the top New York disc jockeys at the time: On his show, he called kids fooling around in parked cars "the submarine races," and the term was widely known enough locally to concern Conza.

He wanted to use the Philadelphia term "hoagies," but Hobokans, being quasi-New Yorkers, didn't recognize the term. Nor did they use the New York term for them, "hero sandwiches." Because of the shape, and the connection to submarines, "torpedo" was also used. In New England, they were called "grinders." In New Orleans, they were "poor boys" or "po'boys." Conza looked through a dictionary, and found the word "blimp," thinking it sounded like a sandwich.

They eventually expanded into a chain, first through the Northeast, then through the country. In the 1970s, delicatessens throughout the country were selling sub sandwiches, putting them on an even keel with hamburgers and fried chicken. But Blimpie would end up getting surpassed in the 1990s, first by Subway, and then, after Jersey Mike's began franchising, by their former inspiration. Blimpie closed many of their stores, including the original in Hoboken.

Their corporate headquarters is now in Scottsdale, Arizona, outside Phoenix. In spite of this, you can still buy a hot and juicy sandwich at Blimpie: It won't be a dry heat.

UPDATE: As of May 16, 2026, the site of the 1st Blimpie store is a "Hawaiian-inspired" health food restaurant named Shaka Kitchen.

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May 16, 1964 was a Saturday. These baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees beat the Kansas City Athletics, 10-6 at Kansas City Municipal Stadium. Steve Hamilton was the winning pitcher, in relief of Stan Williams. Roger Maris hit 2 home runs, and Mickey Mantle and Joe Pepitone each added one.

* The New York Mets lost to the San Francisco Giants, 6-4 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Jim Davenport hit a home run in the bottom of the 15th inning. Willie Mays went 2-for-7 with a home run. Willie McCovey went 2-for-6 with a walk and an RBI. Juan Marichal pitched 9 innings, but would not be the winning pitcher.

Duke Snider, at the end of a great career, who looked strange enough playing for the Mets at the Polo Grounds the year before, looked even stranger as a Giant. He appeared as a pinch-hitter, but did not reach base. Jesse Gonder and Charley Smith each had 3 hits for the Mets.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Minnesota Twins, 6-5 at Fenway Park in Boston. Dick Williams, 3 years away from managing the Sox to a Pennant, singled rookie star Tony Conigliaro home to tie the game in the bottom of the 9th. Dick Radatz, the Sox' closer, singled home the winning run, Lou Clinton, off Jim Perry in the bottom of the 10th inning.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Los Angeles Angels, 5-1 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. Brooks Robinson and Boog Powell hit home runs.

* The Washington Senators beat the Chicago White sox, 3-1 at District of Columbia Stadium in Washington.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Detroit Tigers, 2-1 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Al Kaline did not play.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Chicago Cubs, 5-2 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Frank Robinson went 1-for-4. Ernie Banks went 0-for-4.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Milwaukee Braves, 6-5 at the first Busch Stadium (formerly the last Sportsman's Park) in St. Louis. Hank Aaron went 1-for-4.

* The Houston Colt .45s beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 4-3 at Colt Stadium in Houston. The next year, the Colts moved into the Astrodome, and renamed themselves the Houston Astros.

* And the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 7-4 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Roberto Clemente went 2-for-5 with an RBI. Willie Stargell went 2-for-4 with 4 RBIs.

February 26, 1908: The Hudson Tubes (PATH System) Open

February 26, 1908: The Hudson Tubes open, providing a subway link between New York City and the New Jersey cities of Hoboken, Jersey City, Harrison and Newark. 

Construction had begun in 1873, but it was a long process, with many accidents, including one in 1880 that killed 20 workers. In 1883, the project was abandoned.

The Hudson and Manhattan Railroad Company bought the rights to resume construction in 1902. It was run by William Gibbs McAdoo, who would later marry Eleanor Wilson, daughter of President Woodrow Wilson, and serve as his Secretary of the Treasury. They built a tunnel under 6th Avenue from 33rd Street in Midtown, just south of Herald Square, to 9th Street in Greenwich Village, then turned right under Christopher Street, then crossed the Hudson River.

From there, the tubes turned in 2 different directions. The northward tube went to Hoboken, and connected with the Erie-Lackawanna Railroad Terminal, now the Hoboken Terminal of New Jersey Transit. The southward tube opened in 1912, going to Jersey City, with stops at Newport-Pavonia, Grove Street, and Journal Square.

The H&M's plans to link the system to Grand Central Terminal in Manhattan, the Communipaw Terminal of the Central Railroad of New Jersey in Jersey City, and through Newark all the way to Montclair were abandoned. But in 1937, the line was extended to Harrison, and then across the Passaic River to Newark's Pennsylvania Station.

By 1962, the H&M was bankrupt, and was bought out by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. The Hudson Tubes were rebranded as the Port Authority Trans-Hudson, or PATH, system, although there are still a few tiled signs in the system mentioning "HUDSON TUBES" or "H&M."

In 1971, with the World Trade Center under construction, PATH extended the system to Exchange Place in Jersey City and to the World Trade Center. A plan to extend the Newark portion of the line to Newark International Airport and all the way to Plainfield was abandoned, paving the way for the creation of New Jersey Transit, which took over a Jersey Central line and turned it into the Raritan Valley Line, which included 2 stations in Plainfield, and going further into Somerset and Hunterdon Counties, terminating at High Bridge.

There have been 4 fatal incidents aboard the system:

• On July 22, 1923, a collision near Manhattan Transfer killed one person and injured 15 others.
• On April 26, 1942, a six-car H&M train derailed at Exchange Place. Five people were killed and 222 more were injured. A subsequent investigation found that the motorman was intoxicated.
• On December 17, 1945, a seven-car H&M train collided with a steel barrier on the Dock Bridge west of Harrison, killing the motorman and injuring 67 passengers.
• On July 23, 1963, a PATH train collided with a Pennsylvania Railroad engine east of Harrison, killing two passengers and injuring 28 more.

In 2017, the PATH system was used as a film substitute for the New York Subway for a scene in the film John Wick: Chapter 2.

The idea of extending the line to Newark Airport was renewed in the 2000s, and was approved in 2017, with construction set to begin in 2020, with service to be inaugurated in 2025. Then the COVID epidemic hit in March 2020, putting everything on hold. As of February 26, 2022, it's not clear when construction will begin.

UPDATE: The Port Authority announced in March 2023 that it was deferring funding for the Newark Airport extension to a future capital plan. In 2025, the Hoboken station was closed for a month, so that repairs left over from the 2012 Hurricane Sandy could be made all at once, instead of one weekend at a time over the course of an entire year.

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February 26, 1908 was a Wednesday. Tex Avery, the animator who helped developed the cartoons of both Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Warner Brothers, was born on this day.

Baseball and football were out of season. Professional basketball barely existed. Even hockey was not fully professional. So there were no games on this historic day.

There were challenges for the Stanley Cup that Winter. On January 9 and 13, the Montreal Wanderers, "the Little Men of Iron," featuring later NHL team bosses Lester Patrick of New York and Art Ross of Boston, beat the Ottawa Victorias -- not to be confused with the Ottawa Hockey Club/Silver Seven/Senators. On March 10 and 12, they beat the Winnipeg Maple Leafs -- not to be confused with the later Toronto team of that name. And on March 14, they beat the Toronto Professional Hockey Club, keeping the Cup for another year.