The tire fire looks beautiful from up here.

When The Simpsons Movie was released, 13 different Springfields duked it out online, viral video style, for the chance to be the unofficial home of The Simpsons and to get a screening of the movie.  The winner of that contest was Springfield, Vermont, but according to Simpsons creator Matt Groening, that isn’t exactly where he envisioned The Simpsons living.  The real hometown of The Simpsons is Springfield, Oregon, according to Groening, who spoke with Smithsonian Magazine.

“When I grew up, I realized it was just a fictitious name,” Groening said of his inspiration, the Springfield-centric Father Knows Best. “I also figured out that Springfield was one of the most common names for a city in the U.S.  In anticipation of the success of the show, I thought, ‘This will be cool; everyone will think it’s their Springfield,’ and they do.”

The Oregon connection is strong in Groening’s work, with several Simpsons characters named after streets in his hometown of Portland, Oregon.  Like the fictional Springfield, real Springfield has a statue of a man on a horse in its town square and lives in the shadow of a nuclear power plant (the now-closed Trojan Nuclear Power Plant).  It’s also a pretty lower middle-class town, looked down on its snooty neighbor Eugene, Oregon.  I don’t know if any Playboy cover girls live in real Springfield, though.

Maybe real Springfield could get Banksy to come visit!

Tags: Matt Groening, The Simpsons, Simpsons trivia, Springfield, The Simpsons Springfield based on Springfield Oregon, Oregon, Springfield Oregon Simpsons, television, sitcoms, animation, trivia, Simpsons town based on Oregon town

I’ve never had a problem eating food from a gas station.  Just two weeks ago, I ate a couple of hot dogs purchased from a gas station.  They were delicious.  That’s not the first time I’ve eaten gas station food, and I doubt it will be the last.  There’s nothing like a fun food novelty. […]

Commissioner Roger Goodell gathered 32 NFL owners for one big question.  One of the league’s most wanderlust-stricken franchises is looking to move again.  The Oakland-Los Angeles-Oakland Raiders, tired of gutting it out in a run-down stadium, were once again looking for greener pastures.  Only the Miami Dolphins refused to cooperate.  With a vote of 31-1, […]

In 2006, an injury to Dallas Cowboys starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe opened the door for an undrafted free agent by the name of Tony Romo to take the helm of America’s Team and lead the Dallas Cowboys to an early playoff exit.  Bledsoe went from starter to afterthought in a season.  Now, the circle continues […]

For 89 years, Oscars has never had a major mistake.  The last few Oscars might have had a few flubs, but at least they never got the most important category of the night wrong.  Well, that’s now changed, all thanks to OG Bonnie and Clyde legends Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway.  When Faye Dunaway called […]

Tom Brady has been wildly successful, if controversial.  He’s the first quarterback ever to win five Super Bowls and only the second player to do so after Charles Haley.  Unlike Haley, Brady won all his Super Bowls with the same team, the New England Patriots.  The only thing that seems to be able to stop […]

Ben Affleck, no matter what you might think of him, is a talented actor and director.  He’s got the goods, but he’s smart enough to know when he’s in over his head.  All along, since he took on the mantle of Batman, he’s had his eyes on writing, directing, and starring as the Caped Crusader. […]

In May, students for the for-profit American College of Education were running into some problems.  Their access to email accounts and course information was locked down by Google, who had disabled their accounts.  The reason why?  A fired IT worker for the American College of Education locked the school out of their Google cloud account. […]