To say I’m pleased about the current situation in our country is the biggest understatement of my life. I’m not going to list all of the wonderful things I’ve been seeing and hearing because it would only get me inundated by hateful trolls of the liberal persuasion. This is a country that leads and has always been a source of “firsts”. It has always been the “first” to initiate programs and to do many things that the rest of the world just loves to endlessly talk about. Here’s what a little bit of my research found out about some other “firsts” here in the good old U.S. of A.
The world’s “first” underwater tunnel., the Holland, opened in 1927 in New York under the Hudson River.
Tiros I was the “first” weather satellite launched.
Rev. John Mitchell of Oklahoma, in 1909, organized the “first” troop of the Boy Scouts of America.
In 1958 the “first” commercial jet service, National Airlines, began regular flights between New York and Miami.
In 1995 the Walt Disney company released Toy Story, the “first” film entirely computer-generated.
In 1799 a 12-year-old North Carolina boy discovered gold for the “first” time.
In 1909 Admiral Robert Peary was the “first” man to reach the North Pole.
In 1927 Time magazine’s Man of the Year was Charles Lindbergh for his “first” solo transatlantic flight to Paris.
In 1914 the city of Cleveland installed the “first” traffic light.
The famous four-word phrase, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, was used for the “first” time in York, Pennsylvania in 1777.
Admiral Robert Peary
I could have listed many more ‘firsts”, but I think I’ve made my point. We Americans began as over-achievers when we landed in Plymouth and hopefully it will never stop. Let’s now be the first major power in history to clean up the mess of our Federal Government and begin to once again overachieve.
Being a huge fan of trivia of all sorts, todays post is a quiz of World trivia. This is quite a difficult test and should challenge just about everyone taking it. If you consider yourself a trivia aficionado, then this quiz will definitely test your skills. As always, the answers will be posted at the end of this post. Good luck!
Which continent is the highest – with more than half of it 6,562 feet above sea level?
At what speed was the Titanic traveling when it struck the iceberg and sank on its 1912 maiden voyage?
What four Asian countries are known in economic circles as the Four Tigers?
Where is the White Sea?
What country includes the islands of New Britain and New Ireland?
Who was the first non-head of state – living or dead – to be depicted on a postage stamp?
What great ruler died of a nosebleed on his wedding night?
What was blamed for the death of Emperor Claudius and Tiberius, Czar Alexander I, Pope Clement VII and Charles V of France?
What is the most popular first name in the world?
What continent has no glaciers?
Answers
Antarctica, 22 knots-or just a little more than 25mph, Hong Kong-Singapore-South Korea-Taiwan, Russia, Papua New Guinea, Benjamin Franklin 1847, Atilla the Hun AD 453, Poison mushrooms, Muhammad, Australia
Should a poor family and their cow be blamed for the great Chicago fire? Unfortunately, history is usually recorded by people involved in a catastrophe who have been fed unsubstantiated rumors and innuendos. The O’Leary’s cow was oddly enough a falsely accused scapegoat. Here is additional information to help defend and finally exonerate that poor innocent cow.
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On Sunday night, in Chicago, October 8, 1871, a fire broke out in the barn behind the O’Leary family’s home. Over the course of the next two days, the fire destroyed more than 2000 acres of the city, including the business district. Fatalities were estimated at 250, with approximately 100,000 people losing their homes and businesses. Mrs. O’Leary kept a few cows for milk to sell to her neighbors and she took most of the heat for the fire. Even as the fire raged, rumors were spreading that Mrs. O’Leary had been in the barn when one of her cows kicked over a lantern which ignited the hay. In fact, the lady and her husband were in bed at the time.
Investigators blamed the fire on extremely dry weather conditions, strong winds, and wooden streets and sidewalks. The slow response of overworked firefighters was also held responsible. Unfortunately, the story of Mrs. O’Leary and her cow wouldn’t die, forcing the O’Leary family to eventually leave the city taking that poor innocent cow with them. History can be so unfair.
Do you consider yourself a truthful person? As a young person I thought I was always truthful but as I aged, I discovered just how wrong I was. There have been many times that I used exaggeration to make a point clearer and more interesting but in fact that is actually being somewhat untruthful. I think I can safely say that everyone at one time or another plays fast and loose with the truth for any number of reasons. Here is a collection of comments and quotations about the truth that make a great deal of sense.
“The trouble with stretching the truth is that it’s apt to snap back.” Anonymous
“Truth is such a rare thing; it is delightful to tell it.” Emily Dickinson
“The man who speaks the truth is always at ease.” Persian Proverb
“If you speak the truth have a foot in the stirrup.” Turkish Proverb
“Truth is the anvil which has worn out many a hammer.” Anonymous
“Everyone loves the truth, but not everyone tells it.” Yiddish Proverb
“Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.” Winston Churchill
“Craft must have clothes, but truth lives to go naked.” Thomas Fuller
“Truth is heavy; few therefore can bear it.” Hebrew Proverb
“Seldom any splendid story is wholly true.” Anonymous
And finally, a quote from one of my favorite people: Mark Twain
“When in doubt, tell the truth.“
And here’s one of my own:
“Always tell the truth and do the right thing regardless of the consequences.”
I was sure that the title of this post would draw some immediate attention. It’s well known that this country is addicted to all things sexual. Our TV shows, news programs, and advertisements are filled with sexual content. Sex can also be great fun if done properly and our laws are what helps the society determine that. It’s totally a judgement call but thanks to our colorful history beginning with those god-fearing Pilgrims, sexual matters can be monitored, and the local citizenry makes the determination as to what is considered proper and legal behavior. That’s when things get a little strange. Here is a list of laws addressing sexual behavior from all areas of the country and it doesn’t get much stranger than this. You be the judge.
In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania – It is against the law to have sex with a truck driver in a toll booth.
In Willowdale, Oregon, its unlawful for a husband to talk dirty to his wife during sex.
In Clinton, Oklahoma it is illegal to masturbate while watching two people having sex in a car.
In Newcastle, Wyoming it is illegal to have sex in a butcher shop’s meat locker.
In Ames, Iowa, there is a law against drinking more than three slugs of beer while lying in bed with a woman.
In Kingsville, Texas, there is a law forbidding two pigs from having sex on airport property.
In Ventura County, California there is a law forbidding cats and dogs from having sex without a permit.
In Washington DC, there is a law against having sex in any position but face to face.
In Alexandria, Minnesota, it against the law for a man to have sex with his wife with the stink of onions, sardines, and garlic on his breath.
In Tremonton, Utah, it’s against the law to have sex in an ambulance.
As you are all aware collecting strange facts and stories is my life. It was also a hobby of one of my favorite writers, Isaac Asimov. I’ve mentioned him many times through the years because he was not only a prolific writer but a huge collector of obscure information. Today’s post will be information he collected about the deaths and actions of some interesting individuals. You need to remember that while he collected a lot of information, he was also a big history buff as well. Much of his information concerns people well-known from many years ago. See what you think.
The city morgue in the Bronx, New York, has been so busy at times that next of kin are required to take numbers like they’re in a bakery and then wait in line for their body identification call.
Through the door and windows, would-be assassins poured 73 bullets into Leon Trotsky’s bedroom in his fortresslike house in Mexico City. Thanks to a moment’s warning, Trotsky and his wife escaped unscathed by hiding under the bed. Later in the same year, which was 1940, Trotsky was slain by one man, using an ice pick, who worked himself into the confidence of the old Russian revolutionary. The assassin went by the alias Jacques van den Dreschd, but his true identity remains unknown to this day.
Someone maliciously shouted “Fire” at a copper miners Christmas party in Calumet, Michigan, in 1913. Panic ensued and 72 lives-mostly children’s-were lost.
Calumet Fire Disaster
Stephen Decatur, US naval hero of the Tripoli campaign and of the war of 1812, was challenged in 1822 to a dual by a fellow officer, Commodore James Baron, who was seriously nearsighted. To accommodate his opponent, Decatur agreed to exchange shots at only 8 paces. The duel began and Baron then killed him.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626), The Elizabethan champion of the scientific method, died in pursuit of a better way of preserving food. He caught a severe cold while attempting to preserve a chicken by filling it with snow and later died.
George Eastman (1854-1932) was born poor and had little chance for schooling. Thanks to the profit of the company he founded, Eastman Kodak, he was able to contribute over $100 million to various educational institutions. Eastman committed suicide rather than spending his last years in loneliness and without the prospect of further accomplishments.
President Garfield Assassination
Alexander Graham Bell devised a metal locating tool to help find the assassin’s bullet in President James Garfield in 1881. The capture device was workable, but didn’t work on this occasion because no one had thought of removing the steel spring mattress the president was lying on. Metal, it turned out, interfered with the devices search. The unsanitary methods used in attempting to locate the bullet caused infection to spread throughout Garfield’s body and he died shortly thereafter.
Here are the final words of a favorite: Oscar Wilde
I purposely avoid posting about current political events after running a political blog in the early 2000’s called Anti-Stupidity. It was an interesting experiment that ultimately convinced me never to do it again. No matter what you post politically, half the country agrees, and the other half sends you hate mail and death threats. Such is the political condition of the country, and it hasn’t changed much in the intervening years.
I dislike all politics and political parties and will never understand why anyone would run for office these days. That includes those power-hungry individuals running for President. It would hardly be worth it if not for the corruption that eventually makes almost every former senator, representative, and President a multi-millionaire.
Today’s post is political trivia in its lamest form. These are odd and rarely known facts on many of our past Presidents chosen at random . . .
Jimmy Carter is the first President to have been born in a hospital. All thirty-eight previous presidents were born “at home.”
The chief drafter of the United States Constitution and twice President was a lightweight on the scales. James Madison weighed in at only 100 pounds and he was the shortest President, at 5’4″.
James Buchanan has been the only bachelor to serve as president of the United States.
Not until Herbert Hoover was President., in 1929, did the U.S. Chief Executive have a private telephone in his office. (The telephone had been invented 53 years earlier.) The booth in a White House hallway had served as the president’s private telephone before one was finally installed in the Oval Office.
A campaign issue in John Quincy Adams unsuccessful reelection campaign of 1828 was the White House expense account: $50 for a billiard table, six dollars for billiard balls and $23.50 for chessmen.
The first U.S. President to be born in the 20th century didn’t take office until 1961 – John F. Kennedy (1917-1963).
The longest Presidential inauguration Address lasted nearly two hours, 8,445 words, almost twice as many as any other Presidents. It was delivered during a snowfall by a hatless, coatless William Henry Harrison in 1841. He became ill and died of pneumonia exactly a month later making his presidency the shortest in history.
Theodore Roosevelt was the first US President to ride in an automobile and the first to fly in an airplane, among many other firsts.
Until 1826, white people in the United States were sold as indentured servants who would be freed after a certain period of time. Andrew Johnson, who became President in 1865, was a runaway white slave; advertisements appeared in newspapers in an attempt to get him back.
President William Howard Taft weighed 350 pounds. He got stuck in a bathtub in the White House and someone had to be called to pull him out. He then had a special bathtub made. It was so big that, when it was delivered, four White House workmen climbed into it and had their picture taken.
Welcome to another hot sweltering and sweaty day in Maine. I’ve been confined to my man-cave because it’s the only place in this house where I won’t sweat through my clothing. It’s so bad even my cat is sleeping on a chair right next to me directly under a fan. I’ve always suspected my cat was more intelligent that it was letting on and this just proves it. Since the cat and I are having a week off from my better-half who is vacationing and visiting relatives in Maryland, we can do as we please for a change. We can eat what we want, sleep when we want, and misbehave if necessary. It’s our vacation too.
Today’s post is prompted by a series of facts I’ve recently discovered concerning wives and mistresses. Since I’m the guy who knows virtually nothing about women, I hoped these snippets would give me a better frame of reference. They probably won’t but what the hell, here they are anyway . . .
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Peter the Great had his wife’s lover executed and his head placed into a jar of alcohol. She was required to keep it in her bedroom at all times. (That’s a kinky threesome, for sure.)
Mary Todd (OMG)
Stephen Douglas’s antagonism towards Abraham Lincoln stemmed partly from the fact that Mary Todd had chosen Lincoln over Douglas as a suitor. Mary Todd met both Douglas and Lincoln at the same time and was courted by both. Her ambition led her to evaluate the two men and she chose Lincoln as the most likely to attain future success and as her own best chance for glory.(Who knew Mary Todd wasn’t just crazy but was a slut too?)
In ancient Greece, women counted their age from the date on which they were married, not from the day they were born, signifying that the wedding marked the start of a women’s real-life.(You could end up with a wife who was supposedly twenty years old but really fifty. Yikes!)
The fourth Mogul Emperor, Jahangir, who ruled from 1605 to 1627, had a harem of 300 royal wives, 5000 additional women, and 1000 young men for alternate pleasures.(The man was obviously horny and insane.)
Alexander Gustave Eiffel, the builder of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, which opened in 1889, created at its peak the highest man-made love nest so that he could carry on his personal trysts. The aerie is now opened to all visitors. (Guys will do anything to get high and get laid.)
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The British trounced George Washington’s depleted army at White Plains, then at Fort Washington, then at Brandywine, then at Germantown, and could have easily delivered the knockout blow at Valley Forge in the ferocious winter of 1777–78. But they didn’t. They didn’t attack because William Howell, the British general in command of George III’s forces in the colonies, had found warm comfort in nearby Philadelphia with a certain Mrs. Loring. By spring, the colonial army was able to wiggle off the hook.(Wow! Our country was saved by one piece of strange.)
The Babylonians auctioned off marriageable girls every year. Men had to bid high for the most attractive girls, and their money provided dowries so that the ugly girls, for whom no one would bid, could find husbands. (I think we should reinstitute this immediately.)
By the end of the 16th century, there were approximately 11,600 courtesans in Venice, twelve times the number of patrician wives. The names and addresses of the courtesans were published in a book, copies of which may be seen today in the library of St. Mark. The courtesans were the only commoners who mixed with ease with the Venetian upper class. (And you thought Las Vegas was bad.)
Catherine the Great BOW WOW!
After his love affair of two years with Catherine the Great, Gregory Alexandrovich Potemkin continued to be an important advisor to Catherine. He even helped to choose many of her subsequent lovers. (Every court should have a well-placed pimp in residence.)
When the Elector of Hanover became George I of England in 1714, His wife did not become Queen because she had committed adultery. He placed her under house arrest in Ahlden Castle, where she stayed for 32 years. Those who knew her fate called her the “Prisoner of Ahlden,” And so she remains in history. Ironically, George had arrived in England with his two mistresses. At that time adultery was only a crime for wives.(I’ll bet her guards were well satisfied.)
Being a former police officer, investigator, and professional interrogator has definitely changed my view of people and the criminal justice system as well. I’ve seen more than my share of human beings and their scary-assed responses to damn near everything. These “Karen” videos that seem to be flooding the internet are ridiculous and sad but the movement of the country to the left concerning law enforcement just increases the numbers of these lame and annoying incidents. It allows people who should be arrested to continue their bad behavior and then get their fifteen minutes of fame online. In my opinion this new millennial generation are the absolute worst. They have little or no respect for the law, the officers, or other people. They’ve taken selfishness to the limit and then are the first to complain about damn near everything.
This country’s left leaning approach has been as responsible for forcing police officers to wear body cameras because of bullshit lawsuits filed by idiots who’ve had their feeling hurt by those “mean and nasty police officers” (that was sarcasm for those of you younger than forty years old.) I’m sure anything I say will be immediately disregarded by the younger generations since I’m just an old fart who’s out of touch with today’s reality. That might be partially true, but I like my reality way more than theirs.
Here are a few facts for all of our thin-skinned millennials. They have no idea how bad things can get if the inmates ever decide to run the asylum. Just as a point of information: A “Karen” can be a man or woman caught in viral rants over the actions of others who gripe about seemingly minor inconveniences, sometimes laced with bigoted remarks. Just sooooo nice.
Colorado resident Blair Featherman was filmed shouting racist remarks at a Hispanic family during a pool party at her upscale apartment complex.
Brianna Pinnix, 30, was fired from her job after a video captured her berating a group of German tourists on a New Jersey Transit train, telling them to “get the f— out of our country.”
“We have been dealing with a very vulgar and harassing neighbor since May,” mother Cecillee Cummings wrote in a post on Instagram in December 2023. The family claimed their neighbor also made physical threats to them and their son.
An unruly passenger threatened to urinate in the aisle of a Frontier Airlines flight from Orlando to Philadelphia.
Most Americans are raised get an education, get a job, make money, and then make more money. There’s nothing like starting your work life in your early twenties with a huge student loan debt that will take you years to pay off. Money seems to be the driving force in this country and the pursuit of it is all consuming. In reality, it’s the same almost everywhere else as well. I think a lot of that make-money mindset was passed down through the Great Depression generation like my parents who were concerned with little else. It’s not a bad thing to chase money but how you go about is even more important. Make as much money as you can but try just as hard not to harm or destroy others in the process.
Today’s post involves a short history of money.
At the age of 12, Andrew Carnegie worked as a millhand for $1.20 a week. A half-century later, he sold his steel company for nearly $500 million.
Not a single bank existed anywhere in the 13 colonies before the American Revolution. Anyone needing money had to borrow from an individual.
Although he is famous for inventing the cotton gin, in 1793, Eli Whitney made no money from his invention because he did not have a valid patent on it.
Henry Ford shocked his fellow capitalists by more than doubling the daily wage of most of his workers in 1914, 11 years after he had established his first automobile factory. He knew what he was doing. The buying power of his workers was increased, and their raised consumption stimulated buying elsewhere. Ford called it the “wage motive.”
Paul Revere, the American silversmith and patriot, designed paper money for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, which issued the money in defiance of English law even before independence was declared. The notes were handsome but soon depreciated. Some of them subsequently were used as wallpaper in barbershops.
When Jacob A. Riis published his classic book How the Other Half Lives, in 1890, the fortunes of about 1% of the US population totaled more than the possessions of the remaining 99%. The pattern hasn’t changed all that much. Today, the fortunes of about 8% of the US population total more than the possessions of the remaining 92%.
We hear all of the economy experts constantly raising fears about rising inflation. Here is why!At the height of inflation in Germany in the early 1920s, one American dollar was the equal of 4.2 trillion German marks.
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