November 2011
62 posts
1 tag
Do Drugs, Not Alcohol
During the temperance movement of the 1890s, marijuana was commonly recommended as a substitute for alcohol. The reason for this was that use of marijuana did not lead to domestic violence while alcohol abuse did.
2 tags
4 tags
The Modern Sword of Damocles
Of 43 presidents, a total of eight died in office. Four were assassinated, all by guns: Lincoln in 1865, Garfield in 1881, McKinley in 1901 and Kennedy in 1963. Of the four presidents who died natural deaths in office, William Harrison perished from pneumonia, Zachary Taylor from possible typhoid fever, Warren Harding from a likely heart failure (fortunately not in the arms of his alleged...
2 tags
“I hate quotations.”
– Emerson
3 tags
2 tags
The An Lushan Rebellion
So here’s the set up: it is the Tang Dynasty, in the mid 700s. There is a beloved older emperor, Tang Xuanzong. The most powerful general is close personal friends with the emperor. There is a strong economy, lots of trade, a robust culture, and strong military that is expanding into neighboring countries. This period is known as the “High Tang” — a title not given to any...
5 tags
3 tags
Lucky Guess
In 1699, weary and discouraged at the poor sales of his new almanac, Francis Moore set to work on creating the next issue.
“What shall I put in for June 4?” his assistant asked.
“Oh, cold and snow!” Moore said irritably.
Remarkably, snow actually fell on June 4. Sales of Old Moore’s Almanack bounded into the thousands, and it’s still being published three centuries later.
obitoftheday asked: Recommend you read Daniel Okrent's Prohibition book, "Last Call." Itk makes a thorough case that Joseph Kennedy was, in fact, not connected to gangsters and it was based on rumor and assumption.
3 tags
3 tags
“That which we call sin in others is experiment for us”
– Emerson, an eminent Transcendentalist
3 tags
2 tags
Work Smarter, Not Harder
On Dec. 10, 1968, a uniformed man pulled over a bank car in Tokyo. He explained that police had received a warning that dynamite had been planted in the vehicle, which was transporting bonuses for local Toshiba employees. The four passengers got out and watched as the officer crawled underneath. After a moment he rolled out, shouting that the car was about to explode. When the passengers ran, he...
2 tags
4 tags
“I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.”
– Douglas Adams
7 tags
An Important Pause
The following ‘True Copy of a Jury taken before Judge Doddridge, at the Assizes holden at Huntingdon A.D. 1619,’ may amuse our readers. The Judge had in the preceding circuit censured the Sheriff for impannelling men not qualified by rank for serving on the Grand Jury, and the Sheriff being a humourist, resolved to fit the Judge with sounds at least. On calling over the following names and...
1 tag
During the eighteenth century, women wore “bathing gowns,” which were long dresses of fabric inspired by promenade or lawn dresses. Made from wool or flannel, these bathing costumes had weights sewn into the hem to keep them from floating up. Men would wear a body-fitting wool suit with long legs and sleeves.
3 tags
4 tags
Hi-De-Ho: an exclamation of joy used chiefly by jazz and dance bands (1936)
3 tags
5 tags
Incongruous Backgrounds of Famous Communists
Karl Marx was once a correspondent for the New York Daily Tribune, Ho Chih Min was an assistant pastry chef in Paris, and Josef Stalin studied to be a priest.
1 tag
3 tags
“I’m selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of...”
– Marilyn Monroe
4 tags
3 tags
Thomas Derrick was a hangman in Elizabethan England. Derrick was a convicted rapist who was facing the death penalty. In an event that could be straight out of a spy film, Derrick was offered a pardon by the Earl of Essex, if he worked for the state as an executioner. During his time as a hangman, he designed a new system with a topping lift and pulley, as opposed to the rope over a beam method....
4 tags
1 tag
The Most Talked About House In London
The year was 1809. Famed English author, Theodore Hook, made a bet with one of his close friends, the noted architect and writer, Samuel Beazley, that within one week, he could make any house in London the most talked about place in the city. The house he ended up choosing was the home of the widow Mrs. Tottenham on 54 Berners Street, London.
The event began on November 27. First, a chimney...
2 tags
3 tags
History of Contraceptives
Previous to the Roman Empire, evidence suggests that the withdrawal method was the primary form of contraception used in the world. Incidentally, the withdrawal method is statistically only slightly less effective at preventing pregnancy than condoms (withdrawal: 82% effective vs. condoms: 83% effective, both with real world use).
The withdrawal method fell out of popularity with the Romans who...
6 tags
5 tags
“I arrived at Yale in September, 1884, and turned out for the squad. The college...”
– Amos Stagg, on early football
3 tags
2 tags
Important Things That Happened on Christmas
Charlemagne was crowned the Holy Roman Emperor in 800 AD
Kingdom of Hungary was formed as a Christian kingdom in 1000 AD with the coronation of Stephen I by Pope Sylvester II
William the Conqueror was crowned in 1066
Finally, a non-coronation: Sir Isaac Newton, creator of modern physics and calculus, was born in 1642
Haley’s Comet was confirmed in 1758
First game of ice hockey in 1855
...
1 tag
9 tags
The Royal Tree-Climber
Queen Elizabeth acceded up a tree. When her father, George VI, died in 1952, the princess was staying at the Treetops Hotel in Kenya, essentially an enormous treehouse built into a fig in the Aberdare National Park. While she returned quickly to Britain, hunter Jim Corbett wrote in the visitors’ logbook:
“For the first time in the history of the world, a young girl climbed into a tree one day...
3 tags
2 tags
3 tags
4 tags
5 tags
Thomas Jefferson once composed a secular version of the Christian Gospels. He said he wanted to study Jesus’ teachings without “the artificial vestments in which they have been muffled by priests, who have travestied them into various forms, as instruments of riches and power to themselves.”
He called the Bible’s supernatural content “nonsense,” from which Jesus’ ideas were “as easily...
2 tags
4 tags
Early Training
The 1987 film Predator starred Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jesse Ventura.
Both went on to become United States governors.
6 tags
4 tags
“For 40 years I’ve been an actor on the American stage. My entire family is well...”
– Vaudeville performer Richard Bennett finally gives up
4 tags
2 tags
4 tags
“This tomb holds Diophantus. Ah, what a marvel! And the tomb tells scientifically...”
– epitaph of Diophantus, a Greek mathematician. It tells what age he died, to the mathematically inclined.
4 tags
3 tags
Trojan Horse Two
In 1943, authorities at a German POW camp in Poland discovered that three prisoners were missing. A considerable space separated the prisoners’ huts from the perimeter fence, so at first it wasn’t clear how they’d escaped.
But the three inmates had something in common — all three had exercised during the day on a vaulting horse in the yard. On investigating, the Germans discovered a 100-foot...
5 tags
