FanNation

The smile that launched a thousand clicks. :)

The other day our friendly neighborhood founder posted a great blog with a fantastic closing visual. At last I thought, a worthy subject to convert into a background for my PDA.

This inspired me to take a quick moment to look back on some previous posts. If you want some new ... ahem ... material ... then this isn't the article for you. But if you like Beer, Babes, Sports, and Technology ... then read on.

The typical PDA backdrop is 320 x 240 pixel. For some odd reason, if you email these pictures to yourself they don't work that well. Use a synchronization cable and BAM instant high quality background image to keep your spirits high throughout the day.

In 2008 we don't blink an eye to see a beer commercial during our favorite sports telecasts, usually they feature low brow comedy or else stunning babes. But how did this all begin and who were some famous female sporting pioneers?

Who's On First?

The only two people in the baseball hall of fame that had nothing to do with baseball (i.e they did not play, coach, own a team, etc.) are Abbott and Costello.

Surprisingly, it was not the nation's largest beer makers who led the brewing industry's charge into television. Rather, most of TV's pioneer beer advertisers were regional brewers.

In 1945, New England's Narragansett Beer sponsored the first telecasts of Boston Red Sox games, though neither the brewery nor the baseball team seemed overly confident about the then-infant medium. In fact, Sox management granted Narragansett the sponsorship rights free of charge, telling brewery officials, "We don't know what we're doing, and neither do you."

776 B.C. - The first Olympics are held in ancient Greece. Women are excluded, so they compete every four years in their own Games of Hera, to honor the Greek goddess who ruled over women and the earth.

396 B.C. - Kyniska, a Spartian princess, wins an Olympic chariot race, but is barred from collecting her prize in person.

According to history the original olympians competed naked and well oiled ... wonder if the Games of Hera were held on the Island of ****?

At one point in August 1971, the Pittsburgh Pirates became the first professional team to field nine players who were either black or Latino. Coincidentally, this was the same year that they won the World Series.

Take that Cracker! hahaha, I'm just kidding. Considering the game of baseball was already a hundred years old that's actually a pretty sad fact .

Pro golfer Wayne Levi was the first PGA pro to win a tournament using a colored (orange) ball. He did it in the Hawaiian Open in 1982.

He was last seen patrolling Santa Monica Boulevard in search of a good time.

1552 - Mary, Queen of Scots (1542-87), an avid golfer, coins the term "caddy" by calling her assistants cadets. It is during her reign that the famous golf course at St. Andrews is built.

The sport with highest ratio of officials to participants is tennis. A singles match should have 13; ten linesmen, one net, one foot-fault, plus an umpire.

And they STILL make tons of mistakes ... it's ALWAYS the damn refs ... just ask Utah. Last night's final 2:51 minutes may have been the NBA's declaration that there will be a Boston - VS - LA NBA Finals if Stern has to personally suspend all starters from the remaining teams.

In my disbelief at the clear cut home court reffing I turned to my comfort ... good ol' beer. Sadly, I hadn't gone shopping for a while so I resorted to party beer (you know the drill, my beer is for drinking - sale beer is for hosting). Thanks to television and beer ads I at least knew that my cold beverage came from the land of sky blue waters.

The only person to be elected to both the baseball and football Hall of Fames is Cal Hubbard.

Contrary to popular myth, he did not change his last name to 'Worthington' in order to sell used cars.

1805 - Madeleine Sophie Armant Blanchard solos in the first of 67 gas-powered balloon flights. She made her living as a balloonist, was appointed official Aeronaut of the Empire by Napoleon, and toured Europe until she fell to her death in an aerial fireworks display in 1819.

(insert punchline here:) Apparently she was a smoker too or Setting a bad precedence for Women Drivers.

You already knew that the silhouette on the NBA logo is Jerry West but you probably didn't know that the silhouette on the Major League Baseball logo is Harmon Killebrew.

Did you know there was a push several years ago to 'update the NBA logo' using a Shaq dunk as the model. Other purists disagreed and suggested adapting Air Jordan's logo instead. Thankfully these ideas were shot down and tradition held up. I'm not a huge West lover or anything but come on, history has to count for something.

There are 336 dimples on a regulation golfball.

The maximum weight for a golf ball is 1.62 oz.

In a given round it is likely my club will come into contact with at least 300 dimples prior to being pulled or sliced out of bounds.

1885 - The Association of Collegiate Alumnae publishes a study which concludes that "...it is sufficient to say that female [college] graduates...do not seem to show, ...any marked difference in general health for the average health ... of women engaged in other kinds of work, or in fact, of women generally...", refuting the widely held belief that college study impaired a woman's physical health and ability to bear children.

Of course, most of us who have either gone to college or served in the military know that despite protests to the contrary, there are still TONS of women who have one abbreviation on their mind and it isn't B.A., B.S., or MBA ... it's MRS.

Many Japanese golfers carry "hole-in-one" insurance, because it is traditional in Japan to share one's good luck by sending gifts to all your friends when you get an "ace." The price for what the Japanese term an "albatross" can often reach $10,000.

Thankfully I don't think I need to worry about that too much since I'm neither Japanese nor a great golfer, though I did just enjoy an Eagle two weeks ago ... Breakfast & Beverages for four $69.70 + tip

Totay on the local sports radio show I heard Jim Nantz tell a great story about going to school in Houston with a decent golfer named Freddy Couples. Fred was on a half scholarship and Jim was an invited to attend walk-on. They each had their own dreams, Jim's was to announce the Masters and Fred was to win it. Both dreams came true in 1992. Pretty cool.

Table tennis balls have been known to travel off the paddle at speeds up to105.6 miles per hour.

This fact may have inspired the creative minds behind 'Balls of Furry' which introduced me to a rather oddly attractive flat-chested heroine. I don't often encourage needless surgery but in her case ...

1896 - The first women's intercollegiate basketball championship is played between Stanford and the University of California at Berkely. Stanford wins 2-1 on April 4 before a crowd of 700 women!

Two to One. oooh ... to be a fly on the wall that memorable day as basket-after-basket-after-basket swished in. I guess it's true, the women's game is more fundamentally sound.

Urban legens such as the purity of women's sports is such bunk. That's like saying all latinos have rythmn and are great lovers ...well okay that one may be true ... but still I've seen women suck miss shots, turnover the ball, etc ... Oh and by the way, random vent of the day ... the lady dunk? ooh -- she dropped the ball into the hoop. NO! Hype, Bad Hype. A dunk is like the carrier landing a.k.a. controlled crash ... the true dunk is a blend of MOTION and POWER.

Fact One: Cathy Rigby is the only woman to pose nude for Sports Illustrated. (August 1972)

Fact Two: The August 1972 issue of Sports Illustrated is the most 'return to sender' issue ever.

Fact Three: Just kidding.

In 1963, baseball pitcher Gaylord Perry remarked, "They'll put a man on the moon before I hit a home run." On July 20, 1969, a few hours after Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, Gaylord Perry hit his first, and only, homerun.

1931 - Baseball Commissioner Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis bans women from professional baseball (the bans lasts until 1992), after 17-year-old pitcher Virne Beatrice "Jackie" Mitchell strikes out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in an exhibition game for the Chattanooga Lookouts. Landis voids Mitchell's contract, saying baseball is "too strenuous" for women.

Now we know the real reasons why one of his nicknames was 'the Babe.'

1932 - Amelia Earhart, 34, becomes the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic in a red Lockheed Vega in 15 hours and 39 minutes.

She tried to fly across the Pacific and got lost despite having a seasoned male navigator alongside. If only they'd stopped for gas in Hawaii ...

1932 - American Helene Madison becomes the first woman to swim the 100 yard freestyle in a minute at the Los Angeles Olympics. "Babe" Didrikson becomes the first woman to win medals in three events at the Summer Games. Olympic rules restrict women competitors to three events.

1932 - Two black American women, Louise Stokes and Tidye Pickett qualify for the Olympic Games in Los Angeles, but are not allowed to compete.

Proving once again that women athletes in sports were just as stupid as men when it came to racial ignorance.

Between 10,000 and 15,000 years ago, some humans discontinued their nomadic hunting and gathering and settled down to farm. Grain was the first domesticated crop that started that farming process.

The oldest proven records of brewing are about 6,000 years old and refer to the Sumerians.

Steven Petrosino drank 1 liter of beer (33 ounces) in 1.3 seconds on June 22, 1977 at the Gingerbreadman in Carlise, PA, a 56% improvement over the previous world record set several years earlier by Peter Dowdeswell of England (2.3 seconds for 1 liter). Rumor has it that he did this to impress some chick ... if you saw his picture you'd realize he'd of been better off getting her to drink the beer.

Please don't take that tid bit as a challenge, the record remained undefeated, and was retired as an undefeated record when Guinness removed all alcohol consumption records from their record book in 1991.

Even in 2008 women in sports are still trailblazing. Kudos girls.

2008 - Mirai Nagasu, 14 and the second youngest national champion ever, wins the U.S. National Figure Skating Title.

2008 - Danica Patrick, 26, becomes the first woman to win a major-league Indy-car event with her victory at the Indy Japan 300. It is also the first time a woman won in a national oval-track touring circuit such as the IRL or NASCAR.

2008 - Mexico's Lorena Ochoa becomes the first woman to win four consecutive Ladies Professional Golf Association tournaments in four consecutive weeks. Ranked the No. 1 female golfer in the world, she is the first golfer from Mexico--male or female--to be ranked at the top of the sport.

2008 - South African swimmer Natalie Du Toit, who lost her leg seven years ago, qualified during the world championships to compete in the 2008 Olympic Games, the first amputee to qualify for the Games.

As you can plainly see beer, babes, and sports go together like ... well, beer, babes, and sports. So the next time you find yourself chuckling at the WNBA or the newest female Gladiator "JET" take a moment to pause and reflect on the long and storied history of women in sports and their close ties to making beer drinking more enjoyable.

There it is folks, a new article with a familiar touch so that you can take the best FANNATION has to offer and take it with you.

Unfortunately it's often necessary to dramatically trim the source material, don't get me wrong a little trim is great but my guess is that you all prefer the full photos but there's a good assortment of potential mobile screensavers to get you up (slight pause) and running.

Hope to complete a not so little blurb on the NBA conference semi-finals with a shout out to all the holdouts in the National Felons League. Until then, have a nice day!