James I. asks: I was at Lowes and noticed mailboxes say “approved by the postmaster general”. What specifications do a mailbox need to reach to be approved in this way? I mean, it’s a box with a little door and a flag. Are those the requirements? What’s the process here? Thanks! While the United States Postal Service (USPS) and the […]
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The Greenwood suburb of Tulsa, Oklahoma disappeared overnight during the summer of 1921. Known as the “Black Wall Street,” due to being one of the wealthiest black communities in the United States at the time, Greenwood thrived as the home of Tulsa’s large African American community. But the arrest of a young African American man accused of attempting to rape […]
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Tom R. asks: Who invented tasers? Early use of an electronic control device, like the TASER, by law enforcement occurred in the 1960s when American police officers used electric cattle prods to disperse Civil Rights activists. As for the earliest cattle prods, this came about when inventor John Burton of Wichita, Kansas received a patent (US427549 A) in the late […]
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Kelly asks: Is it true that men snore more than women? If it is true, why and if not where did this stereotype come from? Thanks! When humans sleep, the muscles around our throats relax and cause the airways to narrow. Snoring occurs when certain soft tissues—such as the soft palate (or roof of the mouth), the uvula (the dangling […]
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Amy W. asks: How do they make baby carrots? Unlike cut baby carrots, farmers grow “true” baby carrots to be naturally small, or other times they are simply carrots harvested before they get a chance to completely mature. “True” baby carrots bear the same cone shape as a normal sized carrot while only being a fraction of the size. A […]
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Mekala asks: Is the black box in airplanes really black? Also, who invented it? Thanks! Like many inventions, versions of an airplane “black box” were independently invented by several people, in this case beginning around the 1930s and 1940s. As for the version that began being installed on commercial aircraft, it was invented in response to a tragic loss of […]
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The Mexico of 1968 showed every indication of being the most modern nation in Latin America. President Gustavo Diaz Ordaz oversaw a country with a booming economy and a middle class predominately able to send their children to college for the first time in Mexico’s history. Mexico City was even getting ready to host the 1968 Summer Olympics to open […]
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Ricky A. asks: How do dry cleaners clean the clothes? What happens to clothes after being dropped off at the dry cleaners is a mystery to most. We know that our clothes come back a whole lot cleaner than when we dropped them off, but how? And who first got the bright idea to clean clothing without water? The earliest […]
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Melissa K. asks: The other day you had an article about the Great Depression with that famous picture of the impoverished mother and her kids. Who was she and what ever happened to her? The Great Depression, the worst economic downturn in the history of the United States and the Western world, began on October 24, 1929, a day that […]
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MK23 asks: How do they figure out the maximum occupancy for a building? Generally speaking, the maximum occupancy of a room or building is primarily determined by the available exits, with each exit accommodating only a certain number of people before bottlenecking occurs. The other key component in determining the max occupancy of a building or room is the intended […]
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Body Integrity Identity Disorder, or BIID, is a condition where a person feels an overwhelming desire to become an amputee. Some also consider it to include those who feel a desire to have some sort of other disability like becoming paralyzed or deaf. In the case of those desiring to become amputees, the limb that they want to amputate is […]
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The town of Centralia, Pennsylvania has been on fire for more than fifty years. Founded in 1862, Centralia popped up in response to the booming coal mining industry. Anthracite coal, a type of coal once in high demand for heating homes, lay under the town and surrounding area in massive quantities. (In fact, approximately 95% of all anthracite coal in […]
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M. Favro asks: Why can my house pipes freeze in winter sometimes, but fire hydrants completely exposed to the cold never seem to burst? The fire hydrant that we know today traces its origins back to fire plugs. Water mains that transported fresh water in a city or town used to be made of hollowed out logs buried beneath the […]
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Becky R. asks: Why do they use 21 guns in the 21 gun salute? The 21-gun salute that we know today has its roots in the ancient tradition of warriors demonstrating their peaceful intentions by resting the point of their weapons on the ground. The notion of making a soldier’s weapons useless to show that he came in peace continued […]
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Today I found out about the presidents before the U.S. Constitution went into effect. Schools in the United States teach children from an early age that the first president of the United States was George Washington. But teachers often forget to mention a small, kind of important detail- George Washington was the first U.S. president under the current United States […]
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Gloria N. asks: Why is the stereotype to give apples to teachers? Widespread publicly funded, mandatory education has only been around since about the 19th century. Before then, the responsibility of providing schooling to children fell primarily on their families. Upper- and middle-class families tended to hire tutors or send their children to a private school run by a schoolmaster. […]
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Kaiden asks: Why is 9-1-1 the emergency call number? Before the 1960s, the United States didn’t have one universal phone number for Americans to call if they needed help from the police or fire department. Callers simply had to know the phone number for each department in the area they were currently in. In the case of large cities, there […]
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