Posted August 10, 2020 by Jeffrey Totey This Day in Pop Culture

This Day in Pop Culture for August 10

1947: Smile, You’re on ‘Candid Camera’

Amazingly, the TV show Candid Camera has been on and off the air for over 60 years and has had a stint on NBC, CBS, ABC, PAX and even TV Land. The show was birthed from the radio show called Candid Microphone which aired on ABC radio from 1947-1948. The TV show was famously hosted by Allen Funt (with almost as many co-stars as the series had stations) until 1992 when he became too ill to continue. Funt’s son, Peter, has carried on the tradition. The hidden camera/practical joke show format has pretty much stayed the same over the years. Never mean-spirited, the show exposes real people’s real reactions to crazy behavior and sparked many similar shows, but there can only be one Candid Camera.

The Godfather of Sudoku Dies

Maki Kaji published Japan’s first puzzle magazine after dropping out of Toykyo’s Keio University and then founded the puzzle company, Nikoli in 1983. It was also about this time that he created the game Sudoku. Maki created the puzzle that would be easy for kids and others who didn’t want to think too hard. Nobody outside of Japan really knew about the game until 2004 when it became a hit after a New Zealand pictched it to the British newspaper The Times. By 2006, the puzzle was known in Japan as Gyakuyunyu or Reimport. The name Sudoku was originally called Suji-wa-Dokushin-ni-Kagiru which translates to, “Numbers should be single, a bachelor.” Sadly, Maki passed away on this day from cancer at the age of 69.