Digital Ink Los Angeles

Afrika Bambaattaa, Soul Sonic Force, Egyptian Lover, Mantronix, Run DMC, LL Cool J, and EPMD are break-beat, hip-hop geniuses from the 70s through the 80s.

Everything hip-hop music has become starts with the sampling, looping, and remixing achievements of these forefathers.

Nary a piece of fresh cardboard has been dropped on pavement without a break, hyphy, or crunk dancer knowing these beats.

Boom, pop, boom, boom, pop. Repeat. Got a rock it, don’t stop it. Got a rock it, don’t stop.

Lesson #1: How a Black Spades gang member from the Bronx figured out a way to escape his tenement nightmare via the electronica of Soul Sonic Force and their search for a Planet Rock.

Rock, rock, to the Planet Rock, don’t stop.

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Thanks to and credit to Sport Illustrated‘s photographer, Heinz Kluetmeier, for this 1979 photo insert from 30 years ago.

They called him the Tyler Rose. His leg strength — the weight and fury of those tree trunks churning, jersey #20 at Texas and #34 with the Oilers — Earl Campbell was a perfect blend of balance, strength and speed.

His career with the NCAA’s Texas Longhorns and NFL’s Houston Oilers is a thing of legend — a powerful display of leg strength and nimble feet that make Big Earl the most feared Running Back in history.

Earl was born in 1955 in Tyler, Texas, the sixth of eleven children. When Earl was 11 years old, his father died. Some people say this made Big Earl become a man at a young age.

Well, after leading his Tyler High team to a Texas State Championship, Barry Switzer said he should have gone straight to the pros. In his senior season at Texas in 1977, Earl was awarded the Heisman Trophy, having led the nation in rushing with 1,744 yards. Earl’s best NFL season was 1980. In 15 games with the Houston Oilers he had 373 carries for 1,934 yards, at an average of 5.2 yards per carry with 13 touchdowns.

Watch this YouTube video showing the Power and Force of Earl Campbell with a football in his hands.

For this kind of spirit and human strength, a hero, if not superhero, mythic status, must be offered the Tyler Rose. #34 in the program, #1 in our football hearts.

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John Hughes
(February 18, 1950 – August 6, 2009)

John Hughes created some of the most endearing films of the 80s and 90s, including National Lampoon’s Vacation, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Weird Science, The Breakfast Club, Some Kind of Wonderful, Sixteen Candles, Pretty in Pink, Planes, Trains and Automobiles, Uncle Buck, and Home Alone.

Many, many, many lines of dialogue emerged from this man and his creative mind. Just a few here:

Breakfast Club (1985)
Andrew: We’re all pretty bizarre. Some of us are just better at hiding it, that’s all.

Pretty in Pink (1986)
Blane: You couldn’t buy her, though, that’s what’s killing you, isn’t it? Stef? That’s it, Stef. She thinks you’re shit. And deep down, you know she’s right.

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)
Ferris: Hey, Cameron. You realize if we played by the rules right now we’d be in gym?

Sixteen Candles (1984)
Jake: Happy birthday, Samantha. Make a wish.
Samantha: Well, it already came true.

Thank you, John Hughes. An auteur of alternative imagination, and a kind soul.

Games of the XXIII Olympiad
July 28 — August 12, 1984

The 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, Ca., included rowing at Lake Casitas, archery at UCLA, and volleyball at Long Beach State.

According to the official site, www.olympic.org:

“With the Olympics being held in the United States only four years after the U.S.-led boycott of the Moscow Games, it was not surprising that the Soviet Union organised a revenge boycott in 1984. This time only 14 nations stayed away – but those nations accounted for 58% of the gold medals at the 1976 Olympics.”

The Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum is now known as the home of the USC Trojans football team. In 1984, it was the stage for grand achievements in Track & Field by Britain’s Davey Thompson in the decathlon and USA’s Joan Benoit in the women’s marathon.

Maybe it was the flash of Hollywood lights that inspired “King” Carl Lewis of Houston, Tex., USA, to cast his bronze and stamp his name in the Olympic history books.

As a member of the local Santa Monica Track Club, he matched the achievement of fellow countryman Jesse Owens, by winning four gold medals in the same events as Owens (Berlin 1936): 100m, 200m, 4x100m relay, and the long jump. Carl Lewis dominated the sport as much as Michael Phelps dominates most swimming events.

This photo shows Carl Lewis running the approach track at the Memorial Coliseum on his way to a then world-record, 30-foot long-jump attempt. Twelve years later, Carl Lewis would return to the gold-medal stand as a long shot Gold-Medal winner at the Atlanta 1996 – Games of the XXVI Olympiad.