Love trivia - keeps me sane. My son now supplies me with a lot of information.
I will start off with my favourite -
STEN gun get its name from combining the initials of the surnames of the men most closely involved with its development (Major R V Shepherd and Mr H J Turpin), with the 'En' of Enfield. Shepherd & Turpin of Enfield.
The word "dog" is a complete mystery in etymology. All other Indo-european languages call them some form of "hound" or "pero," and the only other word that sounds like "dog" is the old English insult, which predates the animal word.
John Tyler, the 10th President of the USA (1841-1845) still has one living, at least as of October 2020, grandson
France had its last public execution in 1939, much later than you would assume. The actor Christopher Lee witnessed it.
Michael I, the first Romanov Tsar of Russia, was in residence at Ipatiev Monastery when he was informed that he would be Tsar. Just over 300 years later, Nicholas II and his family were murdered in the basement of Ipatiev House in Ekaterinburg.
Quote: "SleeplessSP"The word "dog" is a complete mystery in etymology. All other Indo-european languages call them some form of "hound" or "pero," and the only other word that sounds like "dog" is the old English insult, which predates the animal word.
Long story short, we probably just made it up.
Building on that, the Canary Islands are actually named after dogs (canis) in Latin, as displayed on their coat-of-arms...
Kane Tanaka, the current oldest living person, was born in 1903. She has witnessed the reigns of every emperor of modern Japan, from Meiji onwards. She has lived through 21 US presidents, from Teddy Roosevelt to Biden and 5 British sovereigns, two Chinese emperors and two Austo-Hungarian emperors. She was 9 years old when the Titanic sank, 15 when WWI came to an end and 42 when Japan surrendered in WWII, her husband and son fought in this war. She was at retirement age when the first man stepped foot on the moon. She is old enough to have witnessed the establishment and collapse of the Soviet Union, was 19 when the Ottoman Empire came to an end and was born less than two years after the death of Queen Victoria. What a life, really makes events of the early 20th century seem not so distant.
Edit: At 118 years old, she has been alive for almost half of the USA's existence.
Koala bears are not bears at all, they are marsupials
All Toads are frogs, but all frogs are not toads.
Tortoises live on land, Turtles live at sea.
Whales farting in the ocean produce 4x as much carbon dioxide as the Amazon Rainforest, hence why its important to stop commercial whaling.
Most of New Zealand's native birds are survivors from the Jurassic and Createacous periods.
Thomas Jefferson, John Adams both died on July 4th 1826, exactly 50 years to the day after the declaration of Independence, James Monroe joined them exactly 5 years later on July 4th 1831.
I love coins. Especially silver, gold and anything really old.
Member of the Royal Numismatic Society of New Zealand and the Auckland Numismatic Society
I was looking for something and came across this page by accident ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Recent_additions/2009/May
where just on that page are hundreds of trivia items. Just for that month and year.
Then at the top of the page is a list of other pages to look at. Must be millions of trivia on there.
Examples from that one page >
· in September 1844 a clown from Astley's Amphitheatre sailed from Vauxhall Bridge to Westminster Bridge in a washtub towed by geese.
· press agent Lee Solters had Pope John Paul II made an honorary Harlem Globetrotter, represented Frank Sinatra for decades and claimed to have known client Dolly Parton "since she was flat-chested".
· the first vampire story written by a woman was The Skeleton Count, by Elizabeth Caroline Grey, in 1828.
· the 1915 Triumph Model H was the first Triumph not fitted with pedals, so it was their first true motorcycle.
· 19th-century actor Henry Neville was the twentieth child of a twentieth child.
and so on ...
Henry Neville was the twentieth child of a twentieth child.......some achievement.
Farting whales;-)
All this info....is definitely broadening the horizons of my knowledge
Marni Nixon was the uncredited lead female singing voice on lots of musical films including The King and I, West Side Story, and My Fair Lady. The actresses just lip synced to her vocal.
Quote: "Moneytane""
Whales farting in the ocean produce 4x as much carbon dioxide as the Amazon Rainforest, hence why its important to stop commercial whaling.
Is something wrong here? Producing carbon dioxide sounds like a reason to keep whaling. The enemy is CO2 right now.
Quote: "Moneytane""
Whales farting in the ocean produce 4x as much carbon dioxide as the Amazon Rainforest, hence why its important to stop commercial whaling.
Is something wrong here? Producing carbon dioxide sounds like a reason to keep whaling. The enemy is CO2 right now.
Unless they mainly fart while being hunted ... any marine biologist around? I'm just an wetland ecologist ... no farting whales around here.
Just call me Bram
No new swaps for the moment, still too many half-ongoing swaps to clean up!
Quote: "BluHawk"The US Bureau of Engraving and Printing will sell $10,000 (£8k) for $45 (£36)
The only catch is the banknotes are shredded, bags of mangled money are to available to purchase on the bureau's website.
The motto on the first US coin was “Mind Your Business”
As an addon to the first one: These are sometimes also sold by random federal reserve facilities and are also sometimes given to people as a gift (e.g., my Uncle got ~50$ in shredded money when he retired from police force).
... no farting whales around here.