![]() The comedy-monster mash-up "Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein" (1948) marked the beginning of their "Abbot and Costello Meet " phase. More hit films like "Pardon My Sarong" (1942), "In Society" (1944) and "The Naughty Nineties" (1945), combined with popular radio appearances on their own program and others like "The Kate Smith Show" - which first broadcast their famous "Who's on First?" routine - kept them at the top of the entertainment heap. With the massive success of their sophomore effort, "Buck Privates" (1941), Abbott and his cohort became two of the biggest movie stars of the wartime era. Growing recognition on the stages of New York eventually led to a guest stint on a popular national radio program, followed by their first film as a team, "One Night in the Tropics" (1940). Born into a show business family, Abbott already had years of experience as a show producer, promoter and performer by the time he teamed up with fellow vaudevillian Costello in the mid-1930s. The leaner, meaner, faster-talking half of one of America's greatest comedic duos, Bud Abbott, along with his partner Lou Costello, was one of Hollywood's biggest stars throughout the 1940s and 1950s. Hence we may learn the destructive nature of avarice, which generally counteracts all its own purposes.Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy (1955) The opportunities he had obtained of acquiring a complete knowledge of the haunts of pirates rendered him one of the most proper men in the world to have extirpated this nest of villains but his own avarice defeated the generous views of some of the greatest and most distinguished men of the age in which he lived. “Thus ended the life of Captain Kidd, a man who, if he had entertained a proper regard to the welfare of the public, or even to his own advantage, might have become a useful citizen to society instead of a disgrace to it. The Newgate Calendar goes on to indulge in a little judging of Kidd’s immortal soul: According to the Newgate Calendar, he died “professing his charity to all the world, and his hopes of salvation through the merits of his Redeemer.” He apparently showed up drunk to his own trial, and then on the day of his execution, the rope broke and he had to be hanged twice. The tale of his trial execution is the stuff of legend. On May 23rd, 1701, Captain Kidd was hanged and gibbeted in London. Kidd’s arrest by Lord Bellomont, Governor of New York At that time, piracy was not technically a crime in the colony, so he was brought to England for trial, and he was imprisoned in Newgate Gaol until May of 1701. Historians are sketchy on the details I got this account from A Maritime History of New York.) He then siezed a French vessel, was abandoned by most of his crew, and when he returned to the port of New York, he found himself wanted for murder and piracy on the high seas. (Well, as far as we know, this is more or less what happened. ![]() After a year or so of floating around the Indian Ocean with no spoils to speak of, his restless crew mutinied and in the ensuing scuffle, Kidd sort of beat one of his crew members to death with a bucket. Kidd crewed his ship under a “no plunder, no pay” policy, which was exactly what it sounded like. His last voyage, on the Adventure Galley, proved ill fated. His main residence was at 119-21 Pearl Street, which more or less corresponds to the modern intersections of Pearl between Wall and Hanover Streets.įor whatever reason, whether to keep up with the financial demands of keeping his wife and two daughters in society’s trappings and finery or because he merely had “ pangs for the sea,” Captain Kidd obtained a new privateer’s license in 1695 and took to sea again. After he wedded dear Sarah, he would find himself possessed of real estate holdings that would make a modern broker salivate: according to Alexander Winston, author of the pirate history No Man Knows My Grave, Kidd owned properties at 56 Wall Street, 86-90 and 119-21 Pearl Street, 52-56 Water Street and 25, 27 and 29 Pine Street. He didn’t move to the then-British colony of New York until he was well into his 40s, after marrying Sarah Bradley Cox Oort, a wealthy widow. William Kidd was born in Scotland in 1645, became a sailor early in life, and had a long and successful career as a privateer.
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