Chief Sitting Bull was originally named "Jumping Badger." Among some American Indian tribes, it was customary to give newborn males temporary names. The names were changed later, as the boys developed character and showed courage in manhood.

Sliced bread was introduced by Otto Frederick Rohwedder who invented the bread slicer, which he started working on in 1912. At first, Rohwedder came up with the idea of a device that held the slices together with hat pins (not a success). In 1928, he designed a machine 1.52m long by 0.90m high that sliced and wrapped the bread in waxed paper to ...Read more

Iridescent beetle shells were the source of the earliest eye glitter ever used — devised by the ancient Egyptians.

Peanut oil is used for underwater cooking in submarines. Undersea fleets like it because it does not smoke unless heated above 450 degrees F.

A ball of glass will bounce higher than a ball of rubber. A ball of solid steel will bounce higher than one made entirely of glass.

The first state minimum wage law in the U.S. went into effect in Massachusetts on July 1, 1913. It would be another 25 years before the minimum wage law went into effect nationally.

The first true calculator, the abacus, originated in China during the sixth century B.C. Its stone-like beads, shifted along vertical strings, enabled the Chinese to perform basic arithmetical operations with speed and accuracy, the test of a true computer. About 200 years after it was used by the Chinese, the abacus caught on in several ...Read more

St. Nicholas was bishop of the Turkish town of Myra in the early fourth century. It was the Dutch who first made him into a Christmas gift-giver, and Dutch settlers brought him to America where his name eventually became the familiar Santa Claus.

It has been estimated that the typical American will spend an average of 2 years of his/her life reading newspapers.

The female knot-tying weaverbird will refuse to mate with a male who has built a shoddy nest. If spurned, the male must take the nest apart and completely rebuild it in order to win the affections of the female.

The Irish custom of "feeding the wren" on December 26 consists of carrying a wren door to door, to collect money for charity. The custom is based on a legend of St. Stephen. Once he was forced to hide in a bush, but a chattering wren gave him away. Children cage the wren to help it do penance for this misdeed. Often the children carry a long ...Read more

According to one study, nuns have an average life expectancy of 77 years, the longest of any group in the United States.

Badminton was once known as battledore and shuttlecock. The game as we know it today took its name from Badminton House in Gloucestershire, England - home of the Duke of Beaufort.

More than one-third of the world's commercial supply of pineapples comes from Hawaii.

The first envelopes with gummed flaps were produced in 1844. In Britain, they were not immediately popular because it was thought to be a serious insult to send a person's saliva to someone else.

Most people fail in adhering to their stated New Year's resolutions. Specifically, 22% fail after one week, 40% after one month, 50% after three months, 60% after six months, and 81% after twenty-four months.

One hundred years ago, visitors to Cave of the Winds in Colorado carried candles and lanterns along ghostly, dark halls that seemed to have no end. Today, cave enthusiasts can spend an hour or more with an authentically dressed 1800s guide, viewing truly spectacular rooms in the cave, using only the illumination from hand-held lanterns. One of ...Read more

The Liberty Bell was not made in the United States and it was not rung on the first Fourth of July. It was cast in London in 1752, cracked in 1835, and was not named "Liberty" until the 1830s in memory of slaves seeking their freedom.

Recycled glass uses only two-thirds the energy needed to manufacture glass from scratch. That means for every soft drink bottle that is recycled, enough energy is saved to run a television set for an hour and a half.

Among his many achievements, the astronomer Johannes Kepler chalked up one about man's inner world. It was Kepler who realized that man's visual apparatus is so constructed that it can produce only inverted images.