This is a weekly wrap of our popular Daily Knowledge Newsletter. You can get that newsletter for free here. The Surprising Truth About the Difference Between Hardwoods and Softwoods Generally speaking, wood is often put into one of two categories- hardwood and softwood. But what exactly makes a given piece of wood qualify as either hard or soft and how […]
Read more
Bert Trautmann was born October 22, 1923 in Bremen, Germany. Blue-eyed and blond haired, Trautmann was the product of a tumultuous political climate within the post-World War I country. He grew up surrounded by Nazi-ideology, including blaming the Jews for the country’s economic problems and believing certain Germans, such as himself, were members of the “master race.” So it’s not […]
Read more
At only a few inches long and with no distinguishing external physical features to speak of, Scutisorex somereni, better known as the Hero or Armoured Shrew, is seemingly an unremarkable creature. That is, until you accidentally step on one. You see, the Hero shrew can comfortably survive being stood on by a typical adult human without any injury. The secret to […]
Read more
Olivia B. asks: Why do women always seem to be fainting in classic books? Dropping like flies (or at least as far as many stories indicate), it seems as if well-bred ladies in the 1800s struggled to maintain consciousness when faced with even the slightest emotional or physical shock. Over the years there have been several theories as to why […]
Read more
Clocking in at 5 minutes and 55 seconds long and encompassing elements of hard rock, opera and pop, Bohemian Rhapsody is certainly one of the more eclectic songs to make it into the charts, but it’s by no means the longest. Hey Jude by The Beatles (7:11), I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That) by Meatloaf (7:58) and All Around […]
Read more
The following is an article from Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Ice Folly It’s not like Spain, with its mild Mediterranean climate, is well known for its frozen lakes and canals. So why would its king contact craftsmen and tell them to drop everything and make 7,000 pairs of skates? And this was back in 1572, long before there were indoor […]
Read more
Richard K. asks: How do they set the dividing line in hardness between what’s considered a hard wood vs. a soft wood? Generally speaking, wood is often put into one of two categories- hardwood and softwood. But what exactly makes a given piece of wood qualify as either hard or soft and how did those definitions come about? Perhaps the most […]
Read more
Nathan G. asks: Why is lead bad for us? Given that humans have been using lead in various product for over 8,000 years (with the first known mining of it in Anatolia around 6500 BCE), you might be surprised to learn that we have known that lead is dangerous and shouldn’t be trifled with since at least 150 BC, when […]
Read more
Oakley420 asks: Why is a lap called a lap? Used as a noun, verb and adjective, most with several distinct meanings, lap is a prominent word in the English language. One of its most common meanings denotes the upper part of the legs when seated. Derived from a Proto-Germanic word *lapp, meaning the “skirt or flap of a garment,” or […]
Read more
Given that he’s mostly famous for playing a “more brawn than brains”, emotionless robot who speaks in fractured English (both in politics and on the big screen…), Arnold Schwarzenegger isn’t exactly thought of by the general public as a very shrewd, intelligent, and calculating businessman. But, it turns out, Arnold was (and is) just that; through a heck of a lot of […]
Read more
Described by the BBC as the “Shadowy sister of the SAS”, The Special Boat Service (more commonly known as the SBS) is likely one of the most well-trained and elite special forces units around today that few in the world have ever heard of, despite performing countless harrowing missions, dozens of hostage rescues and more than its fair share of […]
Read more
The following is an article from Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Apple Seeds In February 1974, a 20 year old college dropout named Steve Jobs answered a newspaper classified ad and landed a $5-per-hour job as a technician at a new company in Los Gatos, California, called Atari. If you’re old enough to remember the 1970s, you probably remember the name: […]
Read more
Being an intern at a German landscaping company during 1992 meant Ökoland Dederow was handed the tedious task of looking through aerial photographs for irrigation lines in a forest located in East Germany. During the course of this, Dederow came across something that definitely was not an irrigation line in photo 106/88. Approximately 140 larch trees in the middle of […]
Read more
According to legend passed down by residents in Western Pennsylvania, you can spot a mysterious “Green Man” walking alongside the road late at night or in a local tunnel where his touch will disrupt a car’s electrical systems. His trademark disfigured face and glowing green skin are said to be the result of an electrical accident. One version of the […]
Read more
This is a weekly wrap of our popular Daily Knowledge Newsletter. You can get that newsletter for free here. Flotsam and Jetsam Bumping into a rock or a reef, war, swamped by rough weather or high waves, pilot error or pirates, there are a variety of ways a ship can sink. After it does, depending on whether it floated out […]
Read more
Ashley W. asks: Where did the male and female symbols come from? Representing two planets, iron, copper and a couple of Olympian gods, the classical symbols for male and female pack a lot of meaning into a few squiggly lines. The symbols themselves are ancient, and the associations they make date back to the dawn of civilization. The ancients, after […]
Read more
Justin R. asks: What is going on in our skin to create goose bumps? A holdover from an earlier stage in our evolution, goose bumps are a function of the autonomic nervous system reacting to a primal threat. Technically, the phenomenon is called the pilomotor reflex, and occurs when the arrector pili muscle, which runs between the base of a […]
Read more
Meaning a complete collection of a set of related things, the curious expression the “whole kit and caboodle” has part of its origin in military life. In the 1785 version of his A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, Francis Grose gives us the first mention of the word “kit” with this meaning, as well as the phrase “the whole […]
Read more