On This Day In History: February 22, 1974 On this day in history, 1974, Samuel Joseph Byck attempted to assassinate President Richard Nixon. Byck’s plan was to take control of an airliner and then force the pilots to fly the plane into the White House, thereby presumably killing the President who was there at the time. Not all went as […]
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Today I found out Ron Jeremy was a special-ed teacher before pursuing a career as an adult film actor. In college, as an undergraduate, Ron Jeremy earned both a B.A. in education and a B.A. degree in theater. He then went on to earn a Master’s degree in special education. His dream was to become an actor, but he pursued […]
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Today I found out Dick Van Dyke was once saved by porpoises when he found himself lost at sea on a surfboard. In his younger years, Dick Van Dyke frequently spent time surfing. In an appearance on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, Van Dyke briefly mentioned one such time he was surfing using a 10 foot long-board and […]
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The Honeyguide is a type of bird that will lead certain animals, most notably the Honey Badger, to beehives. The bird will then wait for the Honey Badger to break open the beehive and to have its fill. Once the Honey Badger has left, the Honeyguide will fly in and eat the leftover larvae and beeswax. Honeyguides are also known […]
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The word “Velcro” is derived from the French “velour” (velvet) and “crochet” (hooks). So essentially, Velcro just means “hooked velvet”. Source
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French toast is traditionally made out of stale bread. Bread has been a staple food for most cultures since food first began being prepared and, up until very recently, the vast majority of humans would have never dreamed of wasting any food; thus, one has to find a way to make stale bread palatable. Soaking it in milk and egg […]
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The ancient Romans once used dolphins to help them fish. The dolphins were trained to drive fish towards fishermen. Once a large enough group of fish was near the fisherman, the dolphins would signal the fishermen to cast their nets. Today, this practice can still be observed in places like Santa Catarina, Brazil. Source
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Peter Jackson didn’t see the completed theatrical version of the Return of the King film from start to finish until watching it at the premiere in New Zealand. This was due to the fact that the final theatrical version of that film wasn’t completed until just five days before that premier. Interestingly, Jackson actually continued to film the Return of […]
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Today I found out the pharmaceutical company Bayer coined the name “Heroin” and marketed the drug as a non-addictive cough medicine, among other uses. While opium itself has been commonly used since at least 3400 BC, heroin is a relatively new invention, derived from opium. Heroin, more technically known as diacetylmorphine, was first synthesized in 1874 by chemist Charles Romley […]
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Mr. Rogers famously didn’t mind if people recorded his show with a VCR, arguing for people’s right to do so in a 1979 case Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc. At the time, it was being argued by the opposition that this constituted a copyright infringement. Mr. Rogers was one of the few involved in television that […]
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This Day In History: February 15, 1946 On this day in history, 1946, the first ever general purpose digital electronic computer was dedicated at the University of Pennsylvania. The machine was called the ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer). It cost over $500,000 (around $6 million today), weighed around 57,000 pounds and took up 1800 square feet. Further, it featured […]
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Today I found out there is a species of jellyfish that can age both forwards and backwards, making them theoretically immortal. Most jellyfish have a lifespan of between a few hours to a few months, though a few varieties can live for several years. The king of them all in terms of biological lifespan is the Turritopsis Nutricula which can […]
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The world’s first automatic bread slicer was invented by Otto Frederick Rohwedder in Davenport, Iowa. He first built a prototype of his bread slicer in 1912. Unfortunately, his blueprints and machine were destroyed in a fire in 1917. From there, he struggled to obtain funding to begin again on his machine as the idea of pre-sliced bread was not at […]
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The U.S. army developed and uses a near silent version of Velcro on their soldier’s uniforms. The version they use reduces the ripping noise by about 95% over traditional Velcro. Unfortunately, you won’t see such Velcro for sale in the store anytime soon as the method of manufacturing this silent Velcro is currently classified by the military. *scumbag military: uses […]
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Today I found out if you eat an excessive amount of carrots, your skin will turn an orangish/yellow shade. Take notes those of you from New Jersey, you don’t need to get a fake tan to turn orange, you can simply eat large amounts of orange plants, such as orange carrots. The resulting condition is known as carotenemia and isn’t […]
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At its core, a microwave oven is a pretty simple device. It’s basically just a magnetron hooked up to a high voltage source. This magnetron directs microwaves into a metal box. These generated microwaves then bounce around inside the microwave until they are absorbed via dielectric loss in various molecules, resulting in the molecules heating up. Matter that works well […]
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Today I found out what grog was originally made from. Although today the word “grog” has more or less turned into a slang term to refer to just about any alcoholic beverage in many parts of the world, particularly in Australia and New Zealand, grog was originally just a mixture of rum with water, sometimes with a bit of lemon […]
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This Day In History: February 9, 1895 On this day in history, 1895, the first volleyball game, originally called “Mintonette” (referencing its similarity to badminton), was played in Holyoke Massachusetts at a YMCA. The inventor of the game was the YMCA athletic director there, William G. Morgan. Morgan had become intrigued by the recently invented game of basketball, which had […]
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