These Historic Figures Should Have Been Famous for their Weird Habits

1. The Time When Johnny Carson Got Slapped Around

While on the air, Johnny Carson was sunshine and sweetness, and the embodiment of the friendly guy you’d like to have as a neighbor. Away from the cameras, however, Carson was a total jerk who bullied and abused others and even physically assaulted people in fits of rage. Examples of Carson being a jackass include an attempt to strangle NBC colleague Tom Snyder, his refusal to visit his son who was institutionalized in a mental asylum, and his verbal and physical abuse of his wives.

Many celebrities abused by Carson stayed quiet to protect their careers from the notoriously vindictive icon. An exception was singer and actor Wayne Newton, who resented Carson’s cracking gay jokes about him on national TV. Newton thought that he and Carson were buddies, and begged him to cut it out. Carson persisted, however. So an incensed Newton barged into Carson’s office, and slapped him around silly. It wasn’t live at the Oscars, but it got Carson’s attention. It was one of the few times that the star TV host got his comeuppance. The gay jokes stopped.

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Where Did We Find This Stuff? Some Sources and Further Reading

Biography – Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

Brook, Timothy – The Troubled Empire: China in the Yuan and Ming Dynasties (2010)

Bushkin, Henry – Johnny Carson (2013)

Culture Trip – 11 Bizarre Things You Didn’t Know About Imelda Marcos

Empire Times Magazine, May 4^th, 2015 – Tolouse-Lautrec: The working woman Authority

Encyclopedia Britannica – James Boswell, Scottish Biographer

Cracked – Old-Timey Icons With WTF Habits

Factinate – 42 Unhinged Facts About Ibrahim, the Mad Sultan of the Ottoman Empire

Guardian, The, June 13^th, 2012 – James Boswell and a History of Gonorrhea

Hertfordshire Life – The Dramatic Life and Passing of Prime Minister Lord Palmerston

History Collection – 10 of the Strangest Rules and Rituals for Royal Births Over the Centuries

IMDb – King Faroukh Biography

Kinross, Lord – The Ottoman Centuries: The Rise and Fall of the Turkish Empire (1977)

Las Vegas Sun, January 24^th, 2005 – Carson Had Long Vegas History

Mad Monarchs – Farouk of Egypt

Massie, Robert K. – Nicholas and Alexandra: An Intimate Account of the Last of the Romanovs and the Fall of Imperial Russia (1967)

Mote, Frederick W. – Imperial China, 900-1800 ­(2003)

Museum Facts – Egypt’s King Farouk or ‘Thief of Cairo’

History Collection – Strange Obsessions Shed New Light on these Historical Figures

National Post, April 18^th, 2017 – ‘I Want to Harm You, Be Brutal With You’: How Mussolini’s Last Love, Fueled by Power, Shaped Him 

National Public Radio – Dining Like Darwin: When Scientists Swallow Their Subjects

New York Times, January 24^th, 1995 – Nijinsky’s Notebooks Are Published, Unexpurgated

Neville, Peter – Mussolini (2004)

Radzinsky, Edvard – The Rasputin File (2000)

San Francisco Gate, February 2^nd, 1995 – Nijinsky Diaries Show Dancer’s Anguish

Short, Philip – Mao: A Life (2001)

Smithsonian Magazine, December 2005 – The Evolution of Charles Darwin

Spiegel, November 26^th, 2009 – In Bed With Benito: Diaries Reveal Mussolini’s Soft Side

Tea in a Teacup – James Boswell and London working women

Vice – Whatever Happened to Imelda Marcos’ 3000 Pairs of Shoes?

Week, The, November 2^nd, 2017 – Osama Bin Laden’s Surprising Video Collection – From Mr. Bean to Chicken Little

Wikipedia – Poetry of Mao Zedong

Wired – Inside Bin Laden’s Files: GIFs, Memes, and Mr. Bean