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    Dogfight at the Pentagon: Sergeant Dogs, Grumpy Cats, Wallflower Wingmen, and Other Lunacy from the Wall Street Journal's A-Hed Column
    Dogfight at the Pentagon: Sergeant Dogs, Grumpy Cats, Wallflower Wingmen, and Other Lunacy from the Wall Street Journal's A-Hed Column
    Dogfight at the Pentagon: Sergeant Dogs, Grumpy Cats, Wallflower Wingmen, and Other Lunacy from the Wall Street Journal's A-Hed Column
    Ebook136 pages1 hour

    Dogfight at the Pentagon: Sergeant Dogs, Grumpy Cats, Wallflower Wingmen, and Other Lunacy from the Wall Street Journal's A-Hed Column

    By Wall Street Journal

    4.5/5

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    About this ebook

    A delightful collection of the wild, the weird, and the wonderful culled from the Wall Street Journal’s popular, and long-standing A-hed column.

    One of the Wall Street Journal’s most popular features for more than seventy years, the daily A-hed column—named for a headline that looked like a letter A—has diverted readers from the more glum news of war, economic woe, natural disasters, and manmade malfeasance. Covering a wide range of lunacy and the unusual from across the nation and the world, the A-hed continues to enchant longtime readers.

    Now, the best A-hed stories from recent years have been bundled into this delightful collection. There are romantic tales, including the Japanese “infidelity phone” (it keeps trysts secret) and the story of “wingmen” and “wingwomen” who escort wallflowers to nightspots and maneuver them into the arms of prospective catches. Lovers of dogs, cats, and fish will learn how a Marine Corps bulldog got promoted to sergeant, how a grumpy cat acquired a Hollywood agent, and will be left wondering if a 63-pound carp named Benson died naturally in England or was the victim of foul play. From pantyhose (or mantyhose) for men to a campaign to recruit youthful nudists, a hairdo archeologist to five escaped wallabies and hippies smoking catnip, these stories will make readers laugh and keep them entertained.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateMay 13, 2014
    ISBN9780062333339
    Dogfight at the Pentagon: Sergeant Dogs, Grumpy Cats, Wallflower Wingmen, and Other Lunacy from the Wall Street Journal's A-Hed Column
    Author

    Wall Street Journal

    The Wall Street Journal is the largest newspaper in the United States by circulation, and is considered the gold standard of journalism. It has been running the A-Hed column for more than seventy years.

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    Reviews for Dogfight at the Pentagon

    4.5/5

    7 ratings3 reviews

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    • 5/5
      The only problem with this book is that it is too short!This is a series of articles originally published in the A-Hed, a column in the Wall Street Journal. Begun in 1941 by the first managing editor, Barney Kilgore, it offers little stories of lunacy to give the readers a break from serious business. The articles are often followed by updates. The subjects vary widely from the controversy over whether Benson, the 63-pound carp was murdered or died naturally; the Marine Corps's mascot Chesty XIII's confrontation with Leon Panetta's golden retriever; and the "hairdo archaeologist" Janet Stephens, whose recreations of historic hairstyles are featured on You Tube.Very funny, I just wish there was more.
    • 4/5
      A collection of interesting and weird stories. I found many of them amuzing.
    • 5/5
      The only problem with this book is that it is too short!This is a series of articles originally published in the A-Hed, a column in the Wall Street Journal. Begun in 1941 by the first managing editor, Barney Kilgore, it offers little stories of lunacy to give the readers a break from serious business. The articles are often followed by updates. The subjects vary widely from the controversy over whether Benson, the 63-pound carp was murdered or died naturally; the Marine Corps's mascot Chesty XIII's confrontation with Leon Panetta's golden retriever; and the "hairdo archaeologist" Janet Stephens, whose recreations of historic hairstyles are featured on You Tube.Very funny, I just wish there was more.

    Book preview

    Dogfight at the Pentagon - Wall Street Journal

    Contents

    Introduction

    PLAY

    The Endless Game of Tag

    A group of kids started a game of tag in high school and kept it going for 23 years.

    RUSSEL ADAMS

    Update: Tag, He’s It for Another Year

    RUSSELL ADAMS

    Wanted: The Young and the Naked

    Changing the nudist demographic is a tough sell. One group tries a naked dinner party in New York.

    DOUGLAS BELKIN

    Walk the Prank

    A portrait of a Navy man, lost at sea in 1908, hangs at the Pentagon . . . except when it mysteriously appears at parties.

    ADAM ENTOUS

    The World’s Biggest Liars

    A region in England prides itself on fibbing.

    ALISTAIR MACDONALD

    Hey, Bro, That’s My Little Pony!

    Bronies are enthralled by cartoon equines.

    VAUHINI VARA AND ANN ZIMMERMAN

    Update: Bronies Still Riding High

    VAUHINI VARA

    The Hershberger Award’s 40-Year Secret

    A fictional sportswriter, his all-star team and the truth about the men behind them.

    RACHEL BACHMAN

    Fishy Story

    Death of anglers’ oft-hooked giant carp spawns a U.K. mystery. The scales of justice await an autopsy.

    ALISTAIR MACDONALD AND PAUL SONNE

    Update: Benson’s Killer Identified

    ALISTAIR MACDONALD

    When Online Reviews Are a Joke

    Everybody’s a comedian when commenting on books on random digits to toilet seats.

    MICHAEL M. PHILLIPS

    WORK

    Cupids-for-Hire

    Mr. Johnson hires a wingman to help him score dates.

    JENNIFER LEVITZ

    Update: Wingman Meets His Match

    JENNIFER LEVITZ

    Clawing Their Way to the Top

    A Hollywood agent turns Internet fame for cats into cash. Grumpy gets a movie deal.

    KATHERINE ROSMAN

    Update: Grumpy Cat Is Top Dog at Show

    JO PIAZZA

    Stand-Up Jobs

    Companies ban sitting to speed things up. Ralph the Chicken decides the next speaker at meetings.

    RACHEL EMMA SILVERMAN

    Fur Flies

    Creative groomers live to dye, but some blanch when it comes to bleaching.

    ANN ZIMMERMAN

    Update: After the Storm

    ANN ZIMMERMAN

    When Mom Goes Viral

    After a review of Olive Garden in Grand Forks, Marilyn Hagerty, 85, is the talk of social media.

    JAMES R. HAGERTY

    Update: Mom’s Fame Grows Beyond Internet

    JAMES R. HAGERTY

    The Dirt on Dirty Jokes

    At stand-up comedy school, students learn that working blue can cost them green.

    BARRY NEWMAN

    Dogfight at the Pentagon

    Some say Chesty’s conduct with Defense Secretary’s Golden Retriever was unbecoming.

    JULIAN E. BARNES

    Update: New Mascot Takes Over

    JULIAN E. BARNES

    On Ancient Pins and Needles

    Hairstylist writes in scholarly journal that ornate Roman coiffures weren’t wigs after all.

    ABIGAIL PESTA

    Bird Battle

    Ms. Dove helps keep planes aloft in war zones by specializing in snarge.

    MICHAEL M. PHILLIPS

    Question Mark over the Apostrophes Future

    Its practically against the law to use the mark in a places name. Sorry, Pikes Peak.

    BARRY NEWMAN

    STUFF

    Grab Your Murse

    Men’s fashion lingo takes a feminine turn. Obama’s Mandals get mixed reviews.

    CHRISTINA PASSARIELLO AND RAY A. SMITH

    The Infidelity Phone

    Cads cling to outdated devices that hide calls and texts. Phone helps one man juggle three girlfriends.

    DAISUKE WAKABAYASHI

    Banking on Authors’ Clutter

    Ken Lopez gets top dollar from libraries for authors’ shopping lists, tax returns, hotel bills and childhood doodles.

    BARRY NEWMAN

    About the Editor

    Credits

    Copyright

    About the Publisher

    Introduction

    BARRY NEWMAN

    What? A stock market rout? Can’t the market do something surprising for a change? A revolution? Didn’t we have one of those last week? Inflation. Deflation. A war surge. A storm surge. The Wall Street Journal lets you read all about all that. But to ease the quantitative tensions of the world’s ups and downs, the Journal also delivers something you can’t predict. It’s the A-Hed.

    The A-Hed, named for a headline that looked like a letter A, first settled into the middle column of Page One in 1941, an invention of the modern paper’s first managing editor, Barney Kilgore. Mr. Kilgore and the editors who followed him thought serious business types could benefit from a little lunacy, and they knew that even in the leanest of times lunacy is never in short supply.

    A while ago, the A-Hed moved to the bottom of the front page, then it earned a home of its own on a Journal Web page. But no matter where it lives, the A-Hed remains one of the liveliest features around. Now a stack of them have been bundled into this book.

    Those of romantic bent will find here an account of the Japanese infidelity phone (it keeps trysts secret) and the story of wingmen and wingwomen who escort wallflowers to nightspots and maneuver them into the arms of prospective catches. Those whose affections lean more toward dogs, cats and fish will learn how a Marine Corps bulldog got promoted to sergeant, how a bored cat acquired a Hollywood agent, and will be left wondering if a 63-pound carp named Benson died naturally in England or was the victim of foul play.

    The fashion conscious have their pick of the rise of pantyhose for men (mantyhose) or an unashamed campaign to recruit youthful nudists. And then there’s the story about a hairdresser, Janet Stephens, at Studio 921 Salon & Day Spa, in Baltimore. Ms. Stephens shook the foundations of ancient scholarship by proving that Roman empresses didn’t wear wigs. She’s a hairdo archaeologist.

    How do Journal reporters, supposedly consumed by issues of import, come across all this weirdness? By keeping their eyes open. Adam Entous covers the Pentagon. Walking its halls in quest of brass to buttonhole during an Afghanistan drawdown and a Syrian flare-up, his eyes fell on a portrait of a Navy man lost at sea in 1908. In another coup for barber-based investigative reporting, he noticed that the guy’s hair looked blow-dried. Back at the office, he dropped everything (well, not quite everything) and worked for weeks to lay bare the greatest—or perhaps only—prank in Pentagon art history.

    Some articles in this collection look into things that go viral on the Internet, like an ineffably guileless review of the new Olive Garden restaurant in Grand Forks, North Dakota. The article’s author, James R. Hagerty, usually writes about manufacturing out of Pittsburgh; the reviewer in Grand Forks was Marilyn Hagerty, his mother. Some other stories here went viral themselves—notably one by Russell Adams about a bunch of high school buddies from Spokane, Washington, who kept a game of tag going for 23 years.

    These improbabilities are only the latest to wind up in what’s become a long line of A-Hed books. The Jilted Aardvark came out in 1970. It had a story about five escaped wallabies, and one about hippies smoking catnip. This book is different, for one thing, because it isn’t on paper. And in those old books, the stories were picked by some snickering editors. Of these stories, more than half rang up top scores on the hit lists of the Journal’s website. So it was snickering readers, not just the editors, who singled them out.

    One final difference: The Wall Street Journal itself. Back when it was a stolid business paper, the A-Hed was known as the icing on the cake. Now the Journal’s sections are thick with icing: Arena, Mansion, Review, Off-Duty and WSJ Magazine. It means the A-Hed has to be sweeter than ever. So curl up with your tablet and read a few. The riots and revolutions can wait.

    PLAY

    The Endless Game of Tag

    RUSSELL ADAMS

    Earlier this month, Brian Dennehy started a new job as chief marketing officer of Nordstrom Inc. In his first week, he pulled aside a colleague to ask a question:

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