Today I found out the origin of superstitions surrounding black cats including why a black cat crossing your path is considered bad luck. Black Cats weren’t always the butt of superstitions, feared, or even considered bad luck. In fact, in early Egyptian times, dating back as far as 3000 BC, cats (including black ones) were the rock stars of the […]
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Daniel G asks: Why is a baker’s dozen 13 and not 12? There are three main theories for why a baker’s dozen is 13 instead of 12, but most think it has its origins in the fact that many societies throughout history have had extremely strict laws concerning baker’s wares, due to the fact that it is fairly easy for bakers to […]
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Today I found out why the toilet is sometimes called a “John”. The term is thought to derive from Sir John Harrington or, at the least, to have been popularized due to Harrington. (There are a few references of the toilet being called “Cousin John”, as well as many references to it being called “Jake” and other such generic names, […]
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Today I found out that in an effort to scare people away from drinking alcohol, the American government once poisoned certain alcohol supplies; this resulted in the death of over 10,000 American Citizens. This, of course, was during Prohibition. The government became frustrated with the fact that despite the manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcohol being banned, the number of […]
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Today I found out about Sullivan Ballou’s letter to his wife written just a few days before the first major land battle of the American Civil War, the First Battle of Bull Run, fought this day (July 21) in 1861 in Manassas, Virginia. Ballou was a major in the U.S. Army and a member of the Rhode Island Volunteers. Before […]
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Today I found out UPS was started by two teenagers with one bicycle and $100 borrowed from a friend. The date was August 28, 1907 and the two kids were 18 year old Claude Ryan and 19 year old Jim Casey. The two had one bike between them and $100 (about $2400 today) borrowed from a friend to found the […]
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Today I found out why some countries drive on the right and some countries drive on the left. The origin of this varies based on the time period and country, but primarily throughout history people used the “keep-left” rule. It has only been very recently that the world has predominately switched to the “keep-right” rule. The first real archaeological evidence […]
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Today I found out where the dollar sign ($) comes from. This symbol first showed up in the 1770s, appearing in documents of English-Americans who had business dealings with Spanish-Americans. However, it wasn’t until the very early 1800s that it became popularized, around the same time as the first official U.S. dollars were being minted. Previous to this, the symbol […]
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Today I found out what the first website ever made was. Simply put, it was a website made by the World Wide Web’s creator Tim Berners-Lee, who was working for CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research). The first ever website was published on August 6, 1991 and served up a page explaining the World Wide Web project and giving information […]
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Today I found out what the M’s stand for in “M&Ms”. In 1941, Forrest Mars Sr., of the Mars candy company, struck a deal with Bruce Murrie, son of famed Hershey president William Murrie, to develop a hard shelled candy with chocolate at the center. Mars needed Hershey’s chocolate because he anticipated there would be a chocolate shortage in the […]
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Today I found out no one really knows why Maine is called Maine. One of the most popular theories is that it is derived from the nautical term “the main” or “Main Land”. Maine has an incredible number of islands off it’s coast, so perhaps sailors referred to it as “Maine”, as in “Main Land”, to distinguish it from the […]
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Today I found out the song “Happy Birthday” is copyrighted and brings in about $2,000,000 per year to the copyright holders (currently an investment group that purchased Warner Music who in turn was the most recent owner of the copyright for the song). The original tune for the song was created by sisters Patty Hill and Mildred J. Hill in […]
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Today I found out the origins of the demotivator meme. The meme, as we know it today, has its origins in a company called Despair, Inc. Before them though was a company called Successories. This company was started by Mac Anderson in 1985. Among their products were motivational posters with the now classic black background and text underneath a picture. Around […]
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Today I found out Duct tape was originally named “Duck” tape and originally only came in green, not silver. Duct tape was originally invented by Johnson & Johnson’s Permacel division during WWII for the military. The military specifically needed a waterproof tape that could be used to keep moisture out of ammunition cases. This is why the originally Duct tape […]
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Today I found that Dr Pepper is the oldest major soft drink, that is still being produced, in the United States; now over 125 years old. In 1885, in the frontier town of Waco Texas (nicknamed “six-shooter junction”), a pharmacists by the name of Charles Alderton worked at the “Old Corner Drug Store” owned by Wade Morrison. At this drug […]
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Today I found out about a Japanese soldier who continued fighting World War II a full 29 years after the Japanese surrendered, because he didn’t know the war was over. Hiroo Onoda is a Japanese citizen that originally worked at a Chinese trading company. When he was 20 years old, he was called to join the Japanese army. He promptly […]
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Today I found out how Valentine’s Day got started. It was all a huge conspiracy jointly popularized by the diamond company De Beers; Hallmark; and the collective might of gourmet chocolate manufacturers the world over … Ok, not really, but it certainly worked out for them didn’t it??? Didn’t it!?!?!?!? 😉 Really though, it actually all started with a little […]
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Today I found out why zippers have a YKK on them. The YKK stands for Yoshida Kogyo Kabushikikaisha (say that five times fast). In 1934 Tadao Yoshida founded Yoshida Kogyo Kabushikikaisha (translated Yoshida Industries Limited). This company is now the world’s foremost zipper manufacturer, making about 90% of all zippers in over 206 facilities in 52 countries. In fact, they […]
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