Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2024 January 18

= January 18 =

One Hundred and One Dalmatians
"What's My Crime?", a television game show that Jasper and Horace watch, is a parody of the classic game show What's My Line?. However, the people on the show (Inspector Graves, Miss Birdwell, Mr. Simpkins, Percival Fauncewater, and the presentator) are modeled after real-life or fictional characters? -- Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.2.59.82 (talk) 11:18, 18 January 2024 (UTC)


 * While I cannot give a definitive answer, the producers of fictional films will generally assiduously avoid basing fictional personages on real living people who might sue them, often including a disclaimer that "any resemblance to real persons is purely coincidental". --Lambiam 15:45, 18 January 2024 (UTC)


 * I've seen one or two 1950s episodes of "What's My Line", but I mostly remember the male panelists standing up when a female contestant enters the set (which would be considered antiquated etiquette now). If any specific individuals were satirized or caricatured in the movie, then they could be among those mentioned in the "Hosts and panelists" subsection of the "What's My Line?" article... AnonMoos (talk) 07:06, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Possibly in the company you keep, but elsewhere people still observe basic courtesies. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 09:11, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
 * It's exactly like a man tipping his hat when he passes by a woman he knows in the street (another item of pre-mid-1960s etiquette): it's so obsolete in the U.S. that people under about 50 years old are unlikely to have ever heard of it, while men would likely need to be at least 70 years old to have ever taken part in such practices when they were socially accepted conventions... AnonMoos (talk) 13:05, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
 * In the UK you could (in my estimation) probably subtract 20–30 years from those figures. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 176.24.47.60 (talk) 16:02, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
 * ✅ Martin of Sheffield (talk) 16:09, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Inspector Graves is clearly the one of Scotland Yard who appears in the Agatha Christie's novel The Moving Finger, but Miss Birdwell and Mr. Simpkins? 193.207.141.67 (talk) 07:14, 21 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Have you find something? 193.207.186.61 (talk) 20:51, 31 January 2024 (UTC)

Where is Becun?
This image shows "Troops of the 1st Royal Berkshire Regiment, 2nd Division, checking the papers of civilians at Becun on the Franco-Belgian border, 10 October 1939". But where is Becun? The section of the border held by the BEF stretched from Armentières westward towards Menin and then south to Maulde. It must be on the French side of the border because Belgium was neutral. Any ideas? Alansplodge (talk) 12:10, 18 January 2024 (UTC)


 * I found one more mention, in the description of another (not digitized) photograph in the IWM's collection related to the British Expeditionary Force in France, taken by the same photographer:
 * Drawing water from one of the blockhouses at Becun – O 769
 * This suggests the unfindability is not the result of a simple typo, but possibly a systematic error by the photographer. I've looked on Google maps along that section of the border for a name that sounds like "Becun", but in vain. But searching for "blockhouses at Becun" led me to a page "Men of 1st Bn Royal Berks at a checkpoint in 1939" containing the following text, quoted from "a transcript of 1 Bn Royal Berks War Diary for the period relating to the IWM photo":
 * LANDAS - 6/10/1939 – 13.53
 * Bn arrrived at the station, detrained and marched to BERCU area. On arrival took over from BORDERS. This included three blockhouses. One in A Coy. Area and two in B Coy. Area.
 * There is a hamlet named "Bercu" in Mouchin, right on the border between Armentières and Maulde. --Lambiam 15:33, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, that seems a likely candidate. It was in the British sector of the border. I have added it to the Bercu disambiguation page. Alansplodge (talk) 18:29, 18 January 2024 (UTC)