I have discovered that most people have no one to talk to, no one, that is, who really wants to listen. When it does at last dawn on a man that you really want to hear about his business, the look that comes over his face is something to see.—Walker Percy, The Moviegoer (1961)

Walker Percy was born 100 years ago today.

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The Sierra Club was founded on this date in 1892 by John Muir and friends.
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Herman Wouk’s first novel was published in 1941. His last was published in 2012. His most recent book, a memoir, was published in January of this year. Herman Wouk is 101 today.
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Today is Towel Day.

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May 25, 1986, was a Sunday. For those of us in America, the day offered a New Yorker the chance to join hands with someone who was holding hands with someone who was holding hands with someone … all the way to the Pacific Ocean (or for a Californian, vice versa, to the Atlantic). It was Hands Across America Day, and Hands Across America was a one-time-only fundraiser for the USA for Africa charity.

Perhaps it is easy to forget that Hands Across America truly happened, that six million individuals actually paid money to reserve spots, which was how the charity raised money. The name itself sounded too much like a punchline awaiting a setup, and the event’s idea sounded forced. One can not predict that an event will be memorable or not. One can not sell that future memorability as a reason to pay money to participate.

As “Do Good/Feel Good” activities go, it may have inadvertently emphasized the “feel good” side of the equation over the “do good,” but 30 years ago today, a line of Americans six million long was indeed assembled and that line did indeed raise an estimated (and estimable!) $34 million to fight hunger and homelessness in America.

If you owned a television set that year, and if it was turned on for even just two minutes during the spring of 1986, it probably showed part of this music video (below the jump):
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