Known to many as the “Crying Indian,” Oscar “Iron Eyes” Cody had a successful career portraying Native Americans in more than 200 films and countless television shows over his 64-year career, culminating in one of the most famous and successful ad campaigns of all time in which he was depicted as a Native American shedding a tear over the rampant […]
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On a brutal Antarctic day in January 1913, without food, dogs, transport or companionship, starving, covered in open sores and with the soles of his feet attached to his body with only tape, 30-year-old Australian geologist and explorer Douglas Mawson’s only remaining motivation for soldiering on was to leave his diary in a place where searchers might eventually find it. […]
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Whenever a director needs to finish a work without a particular actor, but needs to make it appear as if said actor is being filmed, they employ a “Fake Shemp.” So who was the “Shemp” in question and how did the saying get its start in Hollywood? It all began with the Three Stooges and a particular contractual obligation. The […]
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Meaning literally, “right traffic day,” Dagen Högertrafik, or “Dagen H” (H day), was the day in 1967 that the country of Sweden managed to successfully switch from driving on the left-hand side of the road to the right. Not a spur of the moment decision, the Högertrafikomläggningen (“The right hand traffic diversion”) had been planned for years prior to implementation, […]
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Mick asks: Why do some things have plugs with two prongs and others need three to work? To provide a source of power, electricity must flow in a circuit. (Although, you might be surprised to learn the net velocity of the flow of the electrons is actually quite a bit slower than a turtle.) In a typical American outlet, the […]
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Stephanie I. asks: Why do beets turn some peoples pee red while others it doesn’t? Asparagus may be the most well-known urine changer, and even Ben Franklin acknowledged that just “a few stems of asparagus eaten, shall give our urine a disagreeable odor.” Although the precise mechanism is not definitively understood (despite extensive study), it is generally thought that a […]
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Born in Paterson, New Jersey in 1910 to Gustav and Otillia Haast, Bill Haast was interested in snakes since he was 7 years old. This interest turned into something of an obsession during summer trips to Boy Scout camp, beginning when he was 11. The next year Bill suffered his first snake bite from a timber rattlesnake he tried to […]
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James E. asks: Where did the at symbol come from? Ubiquitous today, until its use in email addresses, the @ symbol was never really all that popular, with this very fact being one of the reasons it was chosen to be used in electronic message addresses in the first place. So where did the @ symbol come from? The earliest […]
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Charlie K. asks: Where did the expression “It ain’t over until the fat lady sings” come from? You might think the expression, “The opera ain’t over until the fat lady sings,” derives from some stereotypical “fat lady” singing to close out operas. In particular, some have theorized that the expression in question derives from the last part of Richard Wagner’s […]
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By the time Rainey Bethea was executed on August 14, 1936, most of the United States had ceased executing people publicly. This was in large part because of the natural ghoulishness of the event, combined with the propensity for mistakes that make the whole thing even more disturbing to watch. (This is still a major problem today with approximately 7% […]
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Jessica asks: Are people who are allergic to house cats allergic to tigers and other large cats? One of its most common behaviors greatly contributes to the domestic cat’s propensity to stimulate an allergic response in some humans – its grooming. When the cat licks itself, it stimulates both its salivary glands as well as sebaceous glands in its skin, […]
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In the late 1960s, NASA’s Apollo missions were in full swing, with both Apollos 8 and 10 having successfully launched, orbited the Moon and returned with their astronauts safely to the Earth. By the summer of 1969, the space program was ready to try something new – land a craft with men on the Moon, and then re-launch and bring […]
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Mekala asks: What is amniotic fluid actually made of? Is it just water and stuff the baby poops and pees or is it like saliva? Just wondering. Thanks! Essential for the development of a healthy baby, amniotic fluid is a complex liquid that nourishes, facilitates growth, cushions and protects the growing fetus. Amniotic fluid begins to form almost as soon […]
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In the latter half of the 19th century, more than six million small windmills had been installed in the United States, primarily for the purpose of pumping water for both personal and farming use. In addition, larger windmills were also a common sight in rural America, as these were used to provide water for steam-powered trains where sufficient surface water […]
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Tarin K. asks: What is the single worst crime you could commit, as in, what singular crime would net you the longest prison sentence? With the long-running debate over mandatory minimum sentences over the past couple of decades, it’s easy to forget that judges and juries often have a great deal of discretion when it comes to imposing criminal sentences […]
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Gary asks: Who invented the common shopping cart that seems to be the exact same design in most stores you go to? With the emergence of the automobile, home refrigeration, and the supermarket in the early 20th century, retailers soon realized they had a problem – people now were willing to purchase large quantities of food at once, but had […]
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Characterized by a remarkable return of mental faculties and sometimes physical skills to terminal patients who were thought to have lost such abilities, Terminal Lucidity, while extraordinary, is also a very real and extremely mind boggling phenomenon that has largely been ignored by modern scientists, despite references to it going all the way back to Hippocrates. A relatively recent term, […]
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David S. asks: Here’s one for you, why exactly does Bond, James Bond, like his Martinis shaken and not stirred? A properly made martini is mostly dry gin with a bit of dry vermouth and ice (Epicurious recommends 5 parts gin to 1 part vermouth). All three should be placed into a cocktail shaker, but rather than shaking, they should […]
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