Category Archives: Articles

The Origin of the Bicycle

This is a guest post by Noah Wass- Plastics Engineer, bicycle expert, and owner of BikeInReview.com where you will find professional bike related reviews and interesting biking news.  Subscribe to his newsletter here. The bicycle was invented all the way back in 1817. A certain Baron Karl von Drais needed to get around easier while working in the Royal Gardens […]

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The Final Day in the Life of Orson Wells

On October 9, 1985, the great director and actor, Orson Welles, was scheduled to appear on “The Merv Griffin Show”, one of TV’s most popular talk shows. Griffin had actually met Welles years before at his Beverly Hills Hotel bungalow. “I was right outside his bungalow”, recalled Griffin. “I introduced myself, and he said ‘I know who you are and […]

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The Beatles Song Named for a Woman that was About a Man

The Beatles were famous for their beautiful, inspired love songs dedicated to women- “Michelle”, “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds”, “Eleanor Rigby”, “Julia”, “Lovely Rita”, “Lady Madonna”, “Dear Prudence”.  Even other Beatles’ classics, not graced with titles using proper nouns: “She Loves You”, “She’s a Woman”, “Girl”; and of course “I Want to Hold Your Hand”, “Love Me Do”, “P.S. […]

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The First Time John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr Played Together

It was the autumn of 1960 in Hamburg, Germany. The young, fledgling group who had recently changed their name officially to “The Beatles” were playing at a local club called The Kaiserkeller. Hamburg was a vice-ridden city, a 24-hour-a-day unofficial red light district in itself. Hookers, pimps, thugs, gangsters, drug dealers, and various sundry “characters” and habitues roamed the streets […]

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The First Person to Use the Temporary Insanity Defense was a Congressman Who Murdered the Son of the Composer of “The Star Spangled Banner”

You might think the temporary insanity defense was a relatively new thing.  I mean, maybe it began in the 1940s or possibly the ’30s.  What with all the psychobabble around in those times.  But, no.  It was actually much earlier. It all started with a guy named Daniel Sickles.  Sickles (1819-1914) was a U.S. Senator and later a Congressman, as […]

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“Ye” in Names Like “Ye Olde Coffee Shoppe” Should Be Pronounced “The”, Not “Yee”

Today I found out the “ye” as in “Ye Olde Coffee Shoppe” should be pronounced “the”. The “Ye” here is not the “ye” as in “Judge not, that ye (you) be not judged”, but is rather a remnant of the letter “thorn” or “þorn” (Þ, þ).  The letter thorn was used in Old Norse, Old English-Middle English, Gothic, and Icelandic […]

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