A terrific new book about 1927, an amazing year. Seattle even riots politely. And a way-cool flash mob orchestra

Some years are memorable for one or two major events. Other years, like 1927, had so much stuff in them that they could make up a fantastic book.

In the spring/summer of 1927, here’s a partial list of what happened in America: Charles Lindbergh became the first person to fly from New York to Paris on a solo flight, setting off mass hysterica all across the country. Babe Ruth hit 60 home runs, a new record. Floods destroyed much of the South and put millions out of their homes.
The first talking movie, “The Jazz Singer,” was filmed. Sacco and Vanzetti were executed despite most likely being completely innocent. The events that would set in motion the Great Depression took place.

And oh yeah, Al Capone was in his prime.

It was a remarkable year for so many reasons, and Bill Bryson, who has written a slew of best-sellers, has just published a new book about it. “One Summer, America, 1927,” and I finished reading it the other day.

It’s really terrific in every way; fun to read, informative, hilarious at times, scary at others (truly, the scenes of Lindbergh being literally mobbed at every stop of his celebration tour were horrifying; even in today’s celeb culture, I can’t believe anyone ever had it as bad as he did in 1927. Of course, Lindbergh would turn out to be far, far from heroic as he got older).

Bryson explains all the big topics that year, like Ruth and the floods (which led the rise of Herbert Hoover), in wonderful detail. But it’s the smaller stuff that really hooked me, like how RCA and David Sarnoff completely rubbed out television inventor Philo T. Farnsworth’s place in history, and the sordid saga of Henry Ford and why he gets WAY too much credit for being an innovator.

Bryson’s book brings his characters completely to life (who knew Hoover was so joyless before the Depression even hit?), and I flew through the book.

Highly recommend it if you like American history or just want to know what it was like to be alive in 1927. Check it out on Amazon here.

**You may have seen this video Monday; it was making the rounds on a bunch of sites, and I just think it’s really cute.

It’s of a group of wildly happy Seattle Seahawks fans in their home city, who can’t wait to celebrate their team’s Super Bowl victory… but because it’s the rules, they wait until the light changes to green before crossing.

The video is great; the Twitter meme it sparked is even better. Under the hashtag “How Seattle Riots,” came these gems (more of them are here):

— “Americanos after 9PM… With no room!” #howseattleriots

— “We are going to party until our Priuses run out of juice.” #howseattleriots

— “Taking off all the “contains nuts” and contains gluten” signs off of the appetizers at the Super Bowl party” #HowSeattleRiots

— “Parking in a 15 minute Load/Unload only zone for 16 minutes.” #HowSeattleRiots

— #HowSeattleRiots “Deferring a McAfee scan.”

**Finally today, this video is a couple of years old but was just posted on Facebook by a friend of mine, and I thought it was fabulous: In 2012 the city of Sabadell, Spain was celebrating its 130th anniversary, and to help celebrate a local orchestra helped create an amazing musical flash mob in the town square.

Very, very cool.

A man called Bolt

Lots of things have happened in this sporting summer. Roger Federer won Wimbledon, which thrilled me. The Yankees pulled away in the American League East. Also good.

But I think the greatest phenomenon of the last few months is a 23-year-old Jamaican guy who right now is miles beyond everyone else in his sport.

We’ve become so immune to numbers in athletics. Some guy hits 65 home runs, and we yawn. A running back rushes for 200 yards and four touchdowns. Meh. A basketball player scores 50 points in a game? Pretty good, but … next.

What Usain Bolt is doing right now at the World Championships of track and field in Berlin is a rare and beautiful thing. Every generation, we get an athlete who takes his sport to the next level. Babe Ruth did it in the 1920s.

Muhammad Ali had the 1960s and ’70s. Jack Nicklaus was right there with him in his sport. Some kid from North Carolina named Michael Jordan brought his game into another stratosphere in the 1980s and ’90s, while Michael Phelps brought those in the water up on his shoulders into a glorious place.

What Bolt is doing, in smashing his own world records in the 100 and 200 meter dashes, is something remarkable. He’s destroying the idea that track records are broken in increments, hundredths of a second at a time.

He beat his own 100-meter record by .11, then broke his 200-meter by the same mark. Do you know how ridiculous that is? It’s like a halfback running for 350 yards in a game, or a baseball player hitting 81 home runs in a season.

It’s laughable, how much of a mockery Bolt is making the competition. Poor Tyson Gay ran the 100 this week faster than any American ever had, posting a 9.71. And he wasn’t even close to winning, as Bolt’s 9.58 blew him away.

His margin of victory – 0.62sec – in the 200 is greater than the sum total of winning margins of the five previous winners of the world 200 title.

As many have said this week, Bolt is simply redefining what the human body can do. Consider:

— His 19.19 in the 200, when broken down by 100-meter increments, were a 9.58 and a 9.61. So he equaled his own world record, and then missed it on the second 100 by .03 seconds. Nobody ever runs the second 200 that fast.

— We’ve always been told sprinters have to short and stride quickly. Bolt is 6-foot-5 and takes long strides. When he runs, he’s like a gazelle, attacking the pavement and the air around him like it owes him money.

— He can still get better. In both the Beijing Olympics and in the 200 this week, Bolt slowed a little in the last five meters. He can go faster. He can run a 19.05 200, and maybe a unbelievable 9.4 in the 100.

Listen to veteran track and field people talk about Bolt, and it’s like they used to talk about M.J. when he first started with the Bulls.

TV announcer Ato Boldon just keeps screaming “Oh my God!” when talking about Bolt. Michael Johnson, never known for humility, can’t get over how “ridiculous” Bolt is.

Is the kid a little cocky? Absolutely.  He says things like “I’m on my way to becoming a legend,” and talks about being up for knightood.

But wouldn’t you be a little in love with yourself if you broke the a world record in the last FIVE major meets you’ve competed at?

Now … the big elephant in the room here is this: Is he clean? So far, he’s tested positive for nothing more than excitement. Track and field has been plagued with so many superstars who flash on the scene, then are disgraced by drug testing results.

Ben Johnson. Marion Jones. Justin Gatlin. Just to name a few.

I don’t know if Bolt is clean or dirty. I pray that he’s doing all this legitimately, because it’s such a good story. But a fellow scribe of mine, Jerome Solomon of the Houston Chronicle, wrote a great piece saying that Bolt is providing so much joy, we shouldn’t race to assume he’s guilty.

“You can’t rob me of my joy,” Solomon writes. “He is the most amazing, entertaining athlete on the planet.”

I couldn’t agree more. If it turns out he’s cheating, well, I’ll be sad because he’s such a remarkable runner.

For now, I’m just going to enjoy this Jamaican kid lift everyone higher, higher and higher.

My main man Shaq

A note on tonight’s post:

So I was pretty overwhelmed with emotion earlier; I got a letter back from my 10th grade English teacher, Mr. Gehrhardt, after I’d written him six months ago and wondered if I’d ever hear back from him. He inspired me to do what I do. I want to blog about him but feel I’m too exhausted to tell the story properly. Tomorrow night, me and Mr. G.

Tonight?  Shaq.

I love Shaquille O’Neal. Really. I find him endlessly entertaining, and I’m not 100 percent sure why.

But I have a good idea. The guy just seems to have fun in everything he does. He doesn’t seem to take life too seriously, or anybody else too seriously. He has a perpetual grin on his face, he loves children, and he goes through life, mostly, trying to make sure everyone has a good time.

People say he’s incredibly cocky, but I think it’s mostly for show. I think he’s got a lot of Muhammad Ali in him, bragging so much about himself with his tongue firmly in cheek, all to get a rise out of people.

Here’s the thing, though: I don’t really love watching Shaq play basketball. I’m bored with that. I like watching him do stuff on TV.

I actually watched several episodes last year of Shaq’s Big Challenge, which was a show about Shaquille trying to help overweight kids lose weight, by inspiring and working with them.

And I’ll admit that I tuned into ABC last night for the debut of “Shaq Vs.”

It’s a show where Shaq challenges some of the best athletes in all of sport in their respective fields (OK, so it’s not “Masterpiece Theatre.” Sue me.)

Shaq will swim against Michael Phelps. He’ll try to out-homer Albert Pujols. Last night he played quarterback against Ben Roethlisberger.

I was fairly riveted last night, only because of Shaq. The show is mostly terrible; the “announcers” for the challenge make me want to stick knives in my eyeballs, and there was more “padding” in that one hour of TV than in a hundred Sumo wrestling suits.

But Shaq was funny. He teased Ben, he harassed him, and he showed off some impressive athletic ability.

I don’t know, the guy just seems to get it: He was blessed with some incredible genetic gifts and tremendous ability, and he uses his privileged place in life for good.

So many athletes take themselves so seriously. Shaq seems to get that it’s all a big game. He’s the biggest real life cartoon character we’ve had in sports since, well, since Babe Ruth.

He says goofy stuff and makes crazy threats and says he wants to be sheriff one day.

And I love him for it.

As usual, the great Rick Reilly can sum up Shaq better than I could. Check out this terrific column on Shaq from SI in 2000.