Scarface (also known as Scarface: The Shame of the Nation and The Shame of a Nation) is a 1932 American gangster film starring Paul Muni and George Raft, produced by Howard Hughes, directed by Howard Hawks and Richard Rosson. The film was adapted by Ben Hecht, Seton I. Miller, John Lee Mahin, and W. R. Burnett from Armitage Trail's 1929 novel Scarface. Trail, whose real name was Maurice Coons, wrote for a number of detective-story magazines during the early 20s. At the age of 28, however, Trail, who struggled with morbid obesity throughout his life, died of a heart attack shortly before the release of the 1932 film. The film is loosely based upon the life of Al Capone (whose nickname was "Scarface"). Capone was rumored to have liked the film so much that he owned a print of it. Ben Hecht also said that Capone's men came to visit him to make sure that the film was not based on Capone's life. When he said the film was fictitious, the two men working for Capone left Hecht alone. After repeated demands for a script rewrite from the Hays Office, Howard Hughes ordered Hawks to shoot the film, and "make it as realistic, as grisly as possible." Hawks shot the film at three different locations: Metropolitan Studios, Harold Lloyd Studios and the Mayan Theater in Los Angeles. S hooting took three months with the cast and crew working seven days a week. Hawks decided to include an X symbol above each of Camonte's victims and offered each crew member a hundred dollars to think of a different way to depict the X for every murder. Several accidents happened on the set. Comedian Harold Lloyd's brother Gaylord Lloyd lost an eye when he visited the set and was accidentally shot with live ammunition. George Raft also received a head injury during the death scene of his character when he accidentally hit the door frame while he was slumping to the floor. The first version of the film (Version A) was completed on September 8, 1931, but censors would not allow its release until 1932, because of concerns that it glorified the gangster lifestyle and showed too much violence. Several scenes had to be edited, the subtitle "The Shame of the Nation" as well as a text introduction had to be added, and the ending had to be modified. However, this version still did not pass the New York censors, so Howard Hughes disowned this version and released a version as close as possible to the original version in the states that lacked strict censors and attempted to take the New York censors to court. Hughes also made an attempt to release the film under the title "The Scar" when the original title was disallowed by the Hays office.
This film was the basis for the Brian De Palma 1983 film of the same name starring Al Pacino. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarface_(1932_film)

In 1922, after some risque films and a series of off-screen scandals involving Hollywood stars, the studios enlisted Presbyterian elder Will H. Hays to rehabilitate Hollywood's image. Hollywood in the 1920s was expected to be somewhat corrupt, and many felt the movie industry had always been morally questionable. Political pressure was building, with legislators in 37 states introducing almost 100 movie censorship bills in 1921. Hays was paid the then-lavish sum of $100,000 a year. Hays, Postmaster General under Warren G. Harding and former head of the Republican National Committee, served for 25 years as president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA), where he "defended the industry from attacks, recited soothing nostrums, and negotiated treaties to cease hostilities." The move mimicked the decision Major League Baseball had made in hiring judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis as League Commissioner the previous year to quell questions about the integrity of baseball in the wake of the 1919 World Series gambling scandal; The New York Times even called Hays the "screen Landis". Hays introduced a set of recommendations dubbed "The Formula" in 1924, which the studios were advised to heed, and asked filmmakers to describe to his office the plots of pictures they were planning on making. The Supreme Court had already decided unanimously in 1915 in Mutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio that free speech did not extend to motion pictures, and while there had been token attempts to clean up the movies before, such as when the studios formed the National Association of the Motion Picture Industry (NAMPI) in 1916, little had come of the efforts. New York became the first state to take advantage of the Supreme Court's decision by instituting a censorship board in 1921. Virginia followed suit the following year, with eight individual states having a board by the advent of sound film. But many of these were ineffectual. By the 1920s the New York Stage, a frequent source of subsequent screen material, had topless shows, performances filled with curse words, mature subject matters, and sexually suggestive dialogue. Early in the sound system conversion process, it became apparent that what might be acceptable in New York would not be so in Kansas. In 1927 Hays suggested studio executives form a committee to discuss film censorship. Irving G. Thalberg of Metro Goldwyn Mayer (MGM), Sol Wurtzel of Fox, and E. H. Allen of Paramount responded by collaborating on a list they called the "Don’ts and Be Carefuls" based on items that were challenged by local censor boards, and which consisted of eleven subjects best avoided, and twenty-six to be handled very carefully. The list was approved by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and Hays created the SRC to oversee its implementation. But there was still no way to enforce tenets. The controversy surrounding film standards came to a head in 1929. In 1929, lay Catholic Martin Quigley, who was editor of the Motion Picture Herald, a prominent trade paper, and Jesuit priest Father Daniel A. Lord, created a code of standards (which Hays liked immensely), and submitted it to the studios. Lord was particularly concerned with the effects of sound film on children, whom he considered especially susceptible to their allure. Several studio heads including Irving Thalberg of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), met with Lord and Quigley in February 1930. After some revisions, they agreed to the stipulations of the Code. One of the main motivating factors in adopting the Code was to avoid direct government intervention. It was the responsibility of the SRC headed by Colonel Jason S. Joy (a former American Red Cross executive) to supervise film production and advise the studios when changes or cuts were required. On March 31, the MPPDA agreed that it would abide by the Code. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code

Major Hollywood studios and distributors formed a trade association in 1922 called The Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA). The MPPDA pursued policies of self–regulation with regard to film content, arbitration, intra–industry relations, and negotiations with government entities. They agreed to voluntarily regulate film content by establishing a branch to oversee and control the moral values of the stories they filmed. Initially called The Studio Relations Committee (SRC), but eventually known as the "Hays Office", this branch of the MPPDA consolidated and synthesized the restrictions and eliminations that had been deemed necessary by state and foreign censors and, in 1927, produced a list of "Don'ts and Be Carefuls" to govern production. Members agreed to specifically avoid 11 objectionable topics and to treat 26 others with care and good taste. Studio compliance, however, was often weak and inconsistent because there were no penalties for not following this "code". For instance, of the 572 films submitted to the various censorship boards in 1928, only 42 passed review unscathed.
http://www.pictureshowman.com/articles_genhist_censorship.cfm

Ohio inventor Charles Martin Hall (1863-1914) had just graduated from Oberlin College in 1885 with a bachelor's degree in chemistry, when he invented his inexpensive method of manufacturing pure aluminum. In 1889 he patented
( U.S. patent #400,666) his method. Hans Christian Oersted, a Danish chemist, was the first to produce tiny amounts of aluminum. Later, Friedrich Wöhler, a German chemist, developed a different way to obtain the metal. By 1845, he was able to produce samples large enough to determine some of aluminum's basic properties. Wöhler's method was improved in 1854 by Henri Étienne Sainte-Claire Deville, a French chemist. Deville's process allowed for the commercial production of aluminum. As a result, the price of the metal dropped from around $1200 per kilogram in 1852 to around $40 per kilogram in 1859. Unfortunately, the metal remained too expensive to be widely used.
http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blaluminum.htm

The Perkin Medal was established to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the discovery of mauveine. Today it is now widely acknowledged as the highest honour in American industrial chemistry. Sir William Perkin was a founding Member of the Society of Chemical Industry (SCI) and this Medal was first presented in New York to Perkin himself. http://www.soci.org/Awards/America-Group-Awards/Perkin-Medal.aspx
Charles Hall was awarded the medal in 1911. See all recipients at: http://www.soci.org/Awards/America-Group-Awards/Recipients-Perkin.aspx

Website of the Day Roald Dahl: The Official Web Site www.roalddahl.com
Want to learn more about author Roald Dahl? Head to this official site, which has information on the author (today is his birthday; he was born in 1916), a list of his books, treats and more.
Number to Know 7: Number of Roald Dahl's children's books that have been made into movies. They are "James and the Giant Peach," "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," "Fantastic Mr. Fox," "Danny, the Champion of the World," "The BFG," "The Witches" and "Matilda."
Daily Quote "Unless you have been to boarding school when you are very young, it is absolutely impossible to appreciate the delights of living at home." Roald Dahl
http://www.norwichbulletin.com/news/x219204169/Morning-Minutes-Sept-13#axzz1XpOu8Qs1