The History of Thanksgiving & "What is Thanksgiving and why is it celebrated?"

For thousands of years, mankind has set aside a day each year to celebrate bountiful annual harvests. Before the establishment of formal religions, many ancient farmers believed that their crops contained spirits which caused the crops to grow and die. Many believed that these spirits would be released when the crops were harvested and they had to be destroyed or they would take revenge on the farmers who harvested them. Some of the harvest festivals celebrated the defeat of these spirits. Harvest festivals and Thanksgiving celebrations were held by the ancient Greeks, the Romans, the Hebrews, the Chinese, and the Egyptians.

What is the history of Thanksgiving in United States? The initial "Thanksgiving" feast, held in 1621, was really a traditional English harvest celebration. The Pilgrims shared it with the Native Americans because they had taught the colonists to plants crops and hunt wild game. Without the Native Americans, the Pilgrims may not have survived the harsh winter and been able to celebrate their first harvest of plentiful crops in the New World. The colonists' first harvest feast lasted for three days. Food was served all at once, instead of in courses, so people ate whatever they pleased in the order that they desired. The more important members at the feast were given the best pieces of meat, while the rest of the diners ate whatever was closest to them. Since the Pilgrims didn't use forks or plates, they ate their meal straight off the table with spoons, knives or their fingers. They used large napkins to wipe their hands and also wrapped it around food when it was too hot to hold.

The history of Thanksgiving demonstrates that feasts like the one at Plymouth were held throughout the colonies after fall harvests. However, all thirteen colonies did not celebrate Thanksgiving at the same time. In 1789, George Washington became the first president to declare Thanksgiving a holiday. By the mid-1800s, many states observed the Thanksgiving holiday. Meanwhile, the poet and editor, Sarah J. Hale, had begun lobbying for a national Thanksgiving holiday. During the Civil War President Abraham Lincoln looking for ways to unite the nation, discussed the subject with Hale. In 1863 he gave his Thanksgiving Proclamation declaring the last Thursday in November a day of Thanksgiving.

In 1939, 1940, and 1941 Franklin D. Roosevelt, seeking to lengthen the Christmas shopping season, proclaimed Thanksgiving the third Thursday in November. Controversy ensued, and Congress passed a joint resolution in 1941 decreeing that Thanksgiving should fall on the fourth Thursday of November, where it remains. What is Thanksgiving today? At its heart, it's a holiday where family and friends congregate to catch up, reminisce, tell jokes, share scrumptious food and generally give thanks for all the good things in life-exactly what they did at the very first Thanksgiving.

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Did you know that there are 206 bones in the adult human body and there are 300 in children ( as they grow some of the bones fuse together )

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April Fools Day

It is widely proclaimed that April Fool's day originated in France in 1562, or thereabouts, when Pope Gregory replaced the Julian calender with the Gregorian calender in the Julian calender month of April. The day of introduction of the Gregorian calender was made the first day of January. Some people hadn't heard about the change in the date, so they continued to celebrate the New Year's Day, but it being 1st April. So, others called them "April fools." The fact is that Pope Gregory XIII ordered Thursday 4 October 1582 to be the last day of the Julian calendar. The next day was Friday 15 October. April Fool's Day is an April Fool's tale.

The April Fool's Day tradition in France includes poisson d'avril ("April's fish"), attempting to attach a paper fish to the victim's back without being noticed.

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Modern Russia started with the rule of Peter the Great. He realised that Russia should be westernised to ensure its independence. Already fascinating by mechanical inventions, he studied government and business models of the West.

But Peter also believed in starting from the bottom and working his way up. He learned ship building from the Europeans he invited to Russia, and built a ship himself, which he captained as Peter Alekseevich. In 1697, he accompanied an embassy to European courts as a carpenter named Peter Mikhailov. He also served as seaman, soldier, barber and, to the discomfort of his courtiers, as dentist.

Peter sent Russians to be educated in the West, and imported skilled labour, military and administrative experts from abroad. He encouraged smoking, but taxed tobacco. Because European men usually were clean shaven, he taxed Russians wearing beards. He modernised the calendar, simplified numerals, and encouraged private industry and mining. Remarkably, Peter managed to modernise Russia without borrowing money for his state. Instead, he taxed his citizens heavily.

To ensure continual contact with the West, Peter captured the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea from the Swedes and built a new capital, St. Petersburg, on its shores.

Peter was a big strong man, 2,04 meters (6' 8'' inches) tall, and unlike previous monarchs, not afraid of physical labour. In November 1724, he dived into the cold northern ocean to assist in a ship rescue. It led to his illness and death.

Peter the Great (1672 - 1725) was proclaimed Tzar at age 10, but due to a power struggle had to rule under the patronage of his sister Sofia. He seized control from her when he was just 17. His real name was Peter Romanov.

In 1715, at the funeral of a favourite court dwarf, lines of ecclesiastics were followed by 24 pairs of male and female dwarves arranged by height, followed by Peter and his ministers.

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The Antpitta avis canis Ridgley is a bird that looks like a stuffed duck on stilts and barks like a dog. The bird was discovered by ornithologist Robert S. Ridgley in the Andes in Ecuador in June 1998. Thirty of these long-legged, black-and-white barking birds were found. It apparently had gone undetected because it lives in remote parts and, of course, doesn't sing. The size of a duck, it is one of the largest birds discovered in the last 50 years.

There also are dogs that do not bark! The basenji, smallish dog with a silky copper coat, does not bark. Instead, it yodels when it get excited. Wild dogs like the African Wild Dog also do not bark.

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Although a cow has no upper front teeth, it grazes up to 8 hours a day, taking in about 45 kg (100 lb) of feed and the equivalent of a bath tub full of water. A healthy cow gives about 200,000 glasses of milk in her lifetime.

A cow has four stomachs: the rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum. The rumen is the largest stomach and acts as a fermentation chamber. The abomasum is last of the four and is comparable in both structure and function to the human stomach.

With all its grazing and many stomachs, it is no wonder that cows are one of the main contributors to the hole in the ozone layer. Apart from CFC, the biggest culprit is hydrocarbon emissions from cars and cows. Yes, cows! Cows release some 100 million tons of hydrocarbon annually - by releasing gas. To give you an idea of how much gas a cow emits: if the gas of 10 cows could be captured, it would provide heating for a small house for a year.

But unlike what you think, cows release hydrocarbon mostly by burping.

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Lesser known facts

• Rubber bands last longer when refrigerated.
• Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite.
• The national anthem of Greece has 158 verses.
• No one in Greece has memorized all 158 verses.
• There are 293 ways to make change for a dollar.
• The average person's left hand does 56% of the typing.
• A shark is the only fish that can blink with both eyes.
• There are more chickens than people in the world.
• Two-thirds of the world's eggplant is grown in New Jersey.
• The longest one-syllable word in the English language is "screeched."
• All of the clocks in the movie "Pulp Fiction" are stuck on 4:20.
• No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver or purple.
• "Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt."
• Almonds are a member of the peach family.
• Maine is the only state whose name is just one syllable.
• There are only four words in the English language which end in "-dous" tremendous, horrendous, stupendous and hazardous.
• Los Angeles's full name is "El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciuncula"- and can be abbreviated to 3.63% of its size: "L.A."
• A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.
• An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.
• Tigers have striped skin, not just striped fur.
• In most advertisements, including newspapers, the time displayed on a watch is 10:10.
• Al Capone's business card said he was a used furniture dealer.

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• Marshmallows are extracted from the mucilanginous(there's a word for ya!) roots of the marshmallow plant, which grows in swamps and other fetid areas.

• In industry terms, a “stewardess” can refer to a female or male flight attendant.

• The only new species of mammal that has appeared in the last 1,000 years is the labradoodle.

• The state of Alabama still accepts Confederate scrip as payment for state income taxes.!!!

• A single apple seed contains enough arsenic to kill an adult horse—but not an adult human!

• All the continents begin and end with the same letter. The only exceptions are North America, South America, and Eurasia.

• If you swallow your Adam’s apple, you will choke to death. Well DUHHHH!

• The Viking explorer Leif Garrett discovered America centuries before Columbus or the Native Americans.

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That Mammals are the only animals with flaps around the ears.

African elephants only have four teeth to chew their food with.

A house fly lives only 14 days.

A dog was the first in space and a sheep, a duck and a rooster the first to fly in a hot air balloon.

The oldest breed of dog is the Saluki.

The bee hummingbird of Cuba is the smallest bird in the world.

An annoyed camel will spit at a person.

Pea crabs ( the size of a pea ) are the smallest crabs in the world.

75% of wild birds die before they are 6 months old.

The pig is rated the fourth most intelligent animal but are mentioned only twice in the Bible.But Sheep are mentioned 45 times and goats 88 times in the Bible. Dogs are mentioned 14 times and lions 89 times, but domestic cats are not mentioned.

In Denmark there are twice as many pigs as people.

More Knowledge coming soon!

There is so much that we dont know!

Why waste our minds?

Simply Me!Your little knowledge bank!LOL!

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These Odd laws

During the 6th Century, it was customary to congratulate people who sneezed because it was thought that they were expelling evil from their bodies. During the great plague of Europe, the Pope passed a law to say "God bless you" to one who sneezed.

There still are some weird laws on the books. In Washington state, it is against the law to boast that one's parents are rich. In Maryland, it's illegal to play Randy Newmens "Short People" on the radio. In Alabama it is illegal to play Dominoes on Sunday. And in Minneapolis, double-parkers can be put on a chain gang.

In 1313, King Edward II enacted that "You are forbidden from dying in parliament."

An old statute in Kentucky states that men who push their wives out of bed for inflicting their cold toes on them can be fined or jailed for a week. A 100-year-old law in Willowdale, Oregon makes it illegal to swear during sex. An odd law in Minnesota makes it illegal to hang male and female underwear on the same washing line. In Melbourne, Australia it is illegal for men to parade in strapless dresses - but they are allowed to cross-dress in anything with sleeves.

An old law in Russia allows a police officer to "beat a peeping tom soundly." In Texas, two categories of men are exempt from peeping tom charges: men over 50 and men with only one eye.

A pregnant woman can urinate anywhere she wishes, including a policeman's helmet, according to a London local by-law. But in Vermont, women require their husbands permission to wear false teeth.

In Virginia, horses of more than one year old are prohibited in a place of worship. In Tennessee, shooting any game other than whales from a moving automobile is against the law. In Normal, Oklahoma you could be sent to prison for "making an ugly face at a dog."

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Peter the Great taxed people for growing beards

Modern Russia started with the rule of Peter The Great. He realised that Russia should be westernised to ensure its independence. Already fascinating by mechanical inventions, he studied government and business models of the West.

But Peter also believed in starting from the bottom and working his way up. He learned ship building from the Europeans he invited to Russia, and built a ship himself, which he captained as Peter Alekseevich. In 1697, he accompanied an embassy to European courts as a carpenter named Peter Mikhailov. He also served as seaman, soldier, barber and, to the discomfort of his courtiers, as dentist.

Peter sent Russians to be educated in the West, and imported skilled labour, military and administrative experts from abroad. He encouraged smoking, but taxed tobacco. Because European men usually were clean shaven, he taxed Russians wearing beards. He modernised the calendar, simplified numerals, and encouraged private industry and mining. Remarkably, Peter managed to modernise Russia without borrowing money for his state. Instead, he taxed his citizens heavily.

To ensure continual contact with the West, Peter captured the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea from the Swedes and built a new capital, St. Petersburg, on its shores.

Peter was a big strong man, 2,04 meters (6' 8'' inches) tall, and unlike previous monarchs, not afraid of physical labour. In November 1724, he dived into the cold northern ocean to assist in a ship rescue. It led to his illness and death

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Cows don't have upper front teeth

Although a cow has no upper front teeth, it grazes up to 8 hours a day, taking in about 45 kg (100 lb) of feed and the equivalent of a bath tub full of water. A healthy cow gives about 200,000 glasses of milk in her lifetime.

A cow has four stomachs: the rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum. The rumen is the largest stomach and acts as a fermentation chamber. The abomasum is last of the four and is comparable in both structure and function to the human stomach.

With all its grazing and many stomachs, it is no wonder that cows are one of the main contributors to the hole in the ozone layer. Apart from CFC, the biggest culprit is hydrocarbon emissions from cars and cows. Yes, cows! Cows release some 100 million tons of hydrocarbon annually - by releasing gas. To give you an idea of how much gas a cow emits: if the gas of 10 cows could be captured, it would provide heating for a small house for a year.

But unlike what you think, cows release hydrocarbon mostly by burping.

The average lifespan of a cow is 7 years. The oldest cow ever recorded was Big Bertha. She reached 48 in 1993. She also holds the record for producing 39 calves.
There are more than a billion cattle in the world, about 200 million in India.
Twelve cows are known as a "flink."

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Each year, more movies are produced in India, where the moving image industry is referred to as Bollywood, than in Hollywood. About 1000 movies are released annually in India, about twice the output of Hollywood. The "B" in Bollywood refers to Bombai (renamed Mumbai).

Bollywood movies often are quite long; 3 hours or more of dancing and singing around love as the main plot - although kissing is almost never shown on screen. Everyday, some 14 million Indian people queu for a movie, with more than 4 billion movie tickets sold annually, compared to 3 billion for Hollywood movies worldwide.

The first movie screened publicly was "La Sortie des Ouvriers de l'Usine Lumire" which was presented by Auguste and Louis Lumiere in Paris in 1895. The first movie to use sound was "The Jazz Singer," released in 1927: the first words, spoken by Al Jolson, were: "Wait a minute, you ain't heard nothing yet."

According to the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America), in 1996 the average Hollywood film cost $35.3 million to make and another $17.7 million to market. Disney's "The Lion King" cost $45 million to make and employed a total of 800 animators. Bollywood flicks are produced at average $2m.

The most expensive film ever made as at year 2000, was James Cameron's "Titanic." It cost $200 million, but also was the most successful, in the sense that it won 11 academy awards, equalling "Ben Hur" of 1959.

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~454 BC~:~Inarus~,

Egyptian Pharaoh and leader of the rebellion in Egypt against Persian rule, was taken captive to ~Susa~ after being defeated by the satrap Megabyzus.  There, after five years, he was impaled on three stakes and flayed.

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~458 BC~:  ~Aeschylus~,

Greek playwright, was killed when an eagle dropped a live tortoise on him, mistaking his bald head for a stone. The tortoise survived!

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Scott Paper Company marketed the first rolls of toilet paper. The Company was founded in 1879 by brothers E. Irvin and Clarence Scott in Philadelphia and specialized in producing toilet paper. At first they purchased paper and tissue from outside suppliers and cut, rolled and packaged the paper. They converted large parent rolls of tissue into small rolls and stacked sheets and began to market the product through drug and variety stores under private label names. Then, in 1896, Irvin's son Arthur joined the company at the age of 21. He convinced his father and uncle to phase out their private label business and concentrate on their own brand names. With this, Scott purchased the private label name Waldorf from a Philadelphian 'paper jobber' named Albert DeCernea in 1902 and began producing this as their first brand name. As sales grew, it became evident that production changes were necessary to guarantee consistency. In 1910, Scott bought an abandoned soap factory in Chester, 5 miles south of Philadelphia for $85,000 and began making their own parent rolls of tissue, 72" wide at 150-200 feet per minute instead of buying from others. Rolls were sold with either 650 or 1,000 perforated sheets. In 1915, Scott installed an advanced, high-speed Fourdrinier papermaking machine. It made paper 148" wide at 500 feet per minute. In 1921, their brand, Waldorf represented 64% of Scott's total case sales. By 1925 Scott became the leading toilet paper company in the world.

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Ants can carry 10 times their body weight. Worker ants live one to five years; some queens live longer than 20 years. The biggest ant colony found was on the Ishikari Coast of Hokkaido: 306 million ants, with 1,080,000 queens in 45,000 interconnected nests over an area of 2,7 square kilometres (a square mile).

In the West the most popular male names are James and John and the most popular female name is Mary. Many famous people, of course, don such names even if just for non de plume. A famous name of Scandinavian origin, and that means "all wise" was the real name of one of the most famous persons ever: Elvis. It was at a concert in Minneapolis in 1954 that Al Dvorin first closed Elvis Presley's concerts with a saying that would become very well known: "Ladies and Gentleman, Elvis has left the building. Thank you and good night."

Fettuccine Alfredo - Alfredo di Lelio, an early-20th century Italian chef who invented the dish for his wife in 1914-1920 at his Roman restaurant. The dish became famous in part because Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks touted it after their 1927 visit to Rome. The authentic Alfredo recipe contains only several butters, no cream sauce.

German chocolate cake, originally known as German's Chocolate Cake - the 1950's American cake took its name from Baker's German's Sweet Chocolate, which in turn took its name from Sam German who developed the sweet baking chocolate (between milk and semi-sweet) in 1852.

The actual ownership of the Alice Cooper name is often cited by intellectual property lawyers and law professors as an example of the value of a single copyright or trademark. Since Alice Cooper was originally the name of the band, and not the lead singer (e.g. Uriah Heep, Jethro Tull, etc.), and it was actually owned by the band as whole, Cooper paid, and continues to pay, a yearly royalty to his original bandmates for the right to use the name commercially. While the exact amount is not known, insiders agree that it is a significant enough sum for the other band members to live comfortably on.

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Beer was probably a staple before bread.

The world's oldest known recipe is for beer.

Alcohol beverages have been produced for at least 12,000 years.

 Our early ancestors probably began farming not so much to grow food, which they could usually find easily, as to insure a steady supply of ingredients needed to make alcohol beverages.

A Chinese imperial edict of about 1,116 B.C. asserted that the use of alcohol in moderation was required by heaven.

In ancient Egypt, "bread and beer" was a common greeting

Early Egyptian writings urged mothers to send their children to school with plenty of bread and beer for their lunch.

The Romans drank a wine containing seawater, pitch, rosin, and turpentine. A Greek traveler asserted that it required getting used to.

A Chinese imperial edict of about 1,116 B.C. asserted that the use of alcohol in moderation was required by heaven.

To the pre-Christian Anglo-Saxons, heaven was not a place to play harps, but a place to visit with other departed and enjoy alcohol beverages.

The word "symposium" originally referred to a gathering of men in ancient Greece for an evening of conversation and drinking.

Jesus drank alcohol (Matthew 15:11; Luke 7:33-35) and approved of its moderate consumption (Matthew 15:11).

St. Paul considered alcohol to be a creation of God and inherently good (1 Timothy 4:4).

The early Church declared that alcohol was an inherently good gift of God to be used and enjoyed. While individuals might choose not to drink, to despise alcohol was heresy.

It was largely the monasteries that maintained the knowledge and skills during the Middle Ages necessary to produce quality alcohol beverages.

Distillation was developed during the Middle Ages, and the resulting alcohol was called aqua vitae or "water of life."

The adulteration of alcohol beverage was punishable by death in medieval Scotland.

Drinking liqueurs was required at all treaty signings during the Middle Ages.

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Approximately 55% of movies released are Rated R.

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The famous meeting between President Nixon and Elvis Presley took place on December 21, 1970. There are no White House tape conversations during this meeting because the White House taping system was not installed until February 1971.

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The characters Bert and Ernie on Sesame Street were named after Bert the cop and Ernie the taxi driver in Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

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Everyone needs some sodium in the diet to replace routine losses. The Food and Nutrition Board of the National Academy of Sciences/ National Research Council has estimated that an “adequate and safe” intake of sodium for healthy adults is 1,100 to 3,300 milligrams a day, the equivalent of approximately 1/2 to 1 1/2 teaspoons of salt. Americans, on average, consume at least twice that amount—2,300 to 6,900 milligrams of sodium daily, according to estimates by the Food and Nutrition Board. For some people, consuming high amounts of sodium can cause high blood pressure.

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Research shows that eating too many high-fat foods contributes to high blood cholesterol levels. This can cause hardening of the arteries, coronary heart disease and stroke. High-fat diets may also contribute to a greater risk for some types of cancer, particularly cancers of the breast and colon.

While most Americans get more than 40 percent of their daily calories from fat, the American Heart Association recommends limiting fat to less than 30 percent of daily calories. This means limiting the fast you consume to 50-80 grams per day.

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The American Heart Association recommends eating no more than 300 milligrams of cholesterol per day. But don’t just look at the cholesterol contained in a food item. A product high in total fat or saturated fat can be an even bigger contributor to high blood cholesterol levels. For example, “cholesterol free” potato chips may be high in fat and may contribute to raising your cholesterol level, because high-fat foods cause the formation of cholesterol in the body, even if the food itself contains no cholesterol.

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On the average, to maintain desirable weight, men need about 2,700 calories per day and women need about 2,000 calories per day. It is not well understood why some people can eat much more than others and still maintain a desirable weight. However, one thing is certain—to lose weight, you must take in fewer calories than you burn. This means that you must either choose foods with fewer calories, or you must increase your physical activity, preferably both.

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President Nixon’s favorite breakfast usually consisted of cottage cheese (garnished with either ketchup and/or black pepper), fresh fruit, wheat germ, and coffee. President Nixon also enjoyed yogurt, which was flown in from California every day.

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Did you know there are more than 300,000 fast food restaurants in the U.S. Why is fast food so popular? Because it is convienent, predictable, and fast. Fast food has become a part of the busy American lifestyle. But, nutrition experts point out, fast food is often high in calories, sodium, fat and cholesterol. This does not mean fast food is bad. But it does mean you should fit fast food into a balanced, healthy diet.

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The States typically use one of two methods of numbering the Interstate interchange exits.

The Consecutive numbering system—Starting at the most westerly or southerly point on each Interstate route, interchanges are numbered consecutively. Thus the first interchange becomes Interchange #1. Each succeeding interchange is numbered consecutively as #2, 3, 4,

The Milepost numbering system—All Interstate routes are mileposted beginning at the most westerly or southerly point. The beginning point is milepost ‘0’. If the first interchange on the route is located between milepost 4.0 and 5.0, it is numbered as Interchange #4. The next interchange, if located at milepost 8.7, would be numbered as Interchange #8, etc. With this system the motorist can easily determine the location and distance to a desired interchange.

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There are 293 ways to make change for a dollar.

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The first $1 notes (called United States Notes or “Legal Tenders” were issued by the Federal Government in 1862 and featured a portrait of Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase (1861-1864).

The first use George Washington’s portrait on $1 notes was on Series 1869 United States Notes.

The inclusion of “In God We Trust” on all currency was required by law in 1955. The national motto first appeared on paper money in 1957 on $1 Silver Certificates, and on all Federal Reserve Notes beginning with Series 1963.

The first $1 Federal Reserve Notes were issued in 1963. The design, feauturing George Washington on the face and the Great Seal on the back, has not changed.

Of all the notes printed by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, $1 notes make up about 45% of currency production.

The life span of a $1 Federal Reserve Note is 22 months. (Other denominations have different life spans.

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Ninety percent of all volcanic activity occurs in the oceans. In 1993, scientists located the largest known concentration of active volcanoes on the sea floor in the South Pacific. This area, the size of New York state, hosts 1,133 volcanic cones and sea mounts. Two or three could erupt at any moment.

The highest tides in the world are at the Bay of Fundy, which separates New Brunswick from Nova Scotia. At some times of the year the difference between high and low tide is 53 feet 6 inches, the equivalent of a three-story building.

The oceans cover 71 percent of the Earth’s surface and contain 97 percent of the Earth’s water. Less than 1 percent is fresh water, and 2-3 percent is contained in glaciers and ice caps.

Earth’s longest mountain range is the Mid-Ocean Ridge, which winds around the globe from the Arctic Ocean to the Atlantic, skirting Africa, Asia and Australia, and crossing the Pacific to the west coast of North America. It is four times longer than the Andes, Rockies, and Himalayas combined.

Canada has the longest coastline of any country, at 56,453 miles or around 15 percent of the world’s 372,384 miles of coastlines.

A slow cascade of water beneath the Denmark Strait sinks 2.2 miles, more than 3.5 times farther than Venezuela’s Angel Falls, the tallest waterfall on land.

El Ni–o, a periodic shift of warm waters from the western to eastern Pacific Ocean, has dramatic effects on climate worldwide. In 1982-1983, the most severe El Ni–o of the century created droughts, crop failures, fires, torrential rains, floods, landslides—total damages were estimated at more than $8 billion.

At the deepest point in the ocean the pressure is more than 8 tons per square inch, or the equivalent of one person trying to support 50 jumbo jets.

At 39 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature of almost all of the deep ocean is only a few degrees above freezing.

If mined, all the gold suspended in the world’s seawater would give each person on Earth 9 pounds.

In 1958, the United States Coast Guard icebreaker East Wind measured the world’s tallest known iceberg off western Greenland. At 550 feet it was only 5 feet 6 inches shorter than the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C.

Although Mount Everest, at 29,028 feet, is often called the tallest mountain on Earth, Mauna Kea, an inactive volcano on the island of Hawaii, is actually taller. Only 13,796 feet of Mauna Kea stands above sea level, yet it is 33,465 feet tall if measured from the ocean floor to its summit.

If the ocean’s total salt content were dried, it would cover the continents to a depth of 5 feet.

Undersea earthquakes and other disturbances cause tsunamis, or great waves. The largest recorded tsunami measured 210 feet above sea level when it reached Siberia’s Kamchatka Peninsula in 1737.

The Antarctic Ice Sheet is almost twice the size of the United States.

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2.1 million Americans are currently incarcerated. State and federal prisons hold 1.3 million people, local jails hold 631,240, and 108,965 are held in juvenile facilities. The remainder are in INS, territorial, military or other facilities. This number is triple what it was in 1985 (700,000). In addition, there are 4.6 million persons on probation or parole, bringing the total to 6.7 million citizens—over 3 percent of the adult population—under the supervision of the criminal justice system.

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Community Service Work

8 million hours of unpaid work are performed by offenders on community punishment orders – more commonly known by their previous name – community service orders.

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Face To Face Sex!

Humans are the only species on earth that have face-to-face sex.

Just a fact here!LOL!

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Not all Golf Balls have 360 dimples. There are some as high as 420. Thereare also all different kinds of dimple patterns.

Golf was banned in England in 1457 because it was considered a distraction from the serious pursuit of archery.

Rudyard Kipling, living in Vermont in the 1890's invented the game of snow golf. He would paint his golf balls red so that they could be located in the snow.

Honey is used as a center for golf balls and in antifreeze mixtures.

Before 1850, golf balls were made of leather and were stuffed with feathers.

Golfing great Ben Hogan's famous reply when asked how to improve one's game was: "Hit the ball closer to the hole."

Americans spend more than $630 million a year on golf balls.

The youngest American female to score an ace was Shirley Kunde in August 1943 at age 13.

The oldest player to score his age is C. Arthur Thompson (1869-1975) of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, who scored 103 on the Uplands course of 6,215 yd, age 103 in 1973.

The Tom Thumb golf course was the first miniature golf course in the United States. It was built it 1929 in Chattanooga, Tennessee by John Garnet Carter.

The Chinese Nationalist Golf Association claims the game is of Chinese origin (ch'ui wan - the ball hitting game) in the third or 2nd century BC. There were official ordinances prohibiting a ball game with clubs in Belgium and Holland from 1360.

Two golf clubs claim to be the first established in the United States: the Foxberg Golf Club, Clarion County, PA (1887) and St. Andrews Golf Club of Yonkers, NY (1888).

The youngest golfer recorded to have shot a hole-in-one is Coby Orr (5 years) of Littleton, CO on the 103 yd fifth at the Riverside Golf Course, San Antonio, TX in 1975.

The United States Golf Association (USGA) was founded in 1894 as the governing body of golf in the United States.

Golf-great Billy Casper turned golf pro during the Korean War while serving in the Navy. Casper was assigned to operate and build golf driving ranges for the Navy in the San Diego area.

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Who The World's First Computer Program and Programmer Was!

Ada Lovelace wrote a set of notes specifying in complete detail a method for calculating Bernoulli numbers with the Analytical Engine described by Charles Babbage. This is recognized as the world’s first computer program and she is recognised as the world’s first computer programmer by historians.

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Following is a brief chronology of the metal composition of the cent coin (penny):

The composition was pure copper from 1793 to 1837.

From 1837 to 1857, the cent was made of bronze (95 percent copper, and five percent tin and zinc).

From 1857, the cent was 88 percent copper and 12 percent nickel, giving the coin a whitish appearance.

The cent was again bronze (95 percent copper, and five percent tin and zinc) from 1864 to 1962. (Note: In 1943, the coin’s composition was changed to zinc-coated steel. This change was only for the year 1943 and was due to the critical use of copper for the war effort. However, a limited number of copper pennies were minted that year. You can read more about the rare, collectible 1943 copper penny in “What’s So Special about the 1943 Copper Penny.”

In 1962, the cent’s tin content, which was quite small, was removed. That made the metal composition of the cent 95 percent copper and 5 percent

The alloy remained 95 percent copper and 5 percent zinc until 1982, when the composition was changed to 97.5 percent zinc and 2.5 percent copper (copper-plated zinc). Cents of both compositions appeared in that year.

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Following is a brief chronology of the metal composition of the cent coin (penny):

The composition was pure copper from 1793 to 1837.

From 1837 to 1857, the cent was made of bronze (95 percent copper, and five percent tin and zinc).

From 1857, the cent was 88 percent copper and 12 percent nickel, giving the coin a whitish appearance.

The cent was again bronze (95 percent copper, and five percent tin and zinc) from 1864 to 1962. (Note: In 1943, the coin’s composition was changed to zinc-coated steel. This change was only for the year 1943 and was due to the critical use of copper for the war effort. However, a limited number of copper pennies were minted that year. You can read more about the rare, collectible 1943 copper penny in “What’s So Special about the 1943 Copper Penny.”

In 1962, the cent’s tin content, which was quite small, was removed. That made the metal composition of the cent 95 percent copper and 5 percent

The alloy remained 95 percent copper and 5 percent zinc until 1982, when the composition was changed to 97.5 percent zinc and 2.5 percent copper (copper-plated zinc). Cents of both compositions appeared in that year.

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Benjamin Harrison was the only president to be a grandson of a president (William Henry Harrison) and great-grandson to a signer of the Declaration of Independence (Benjamin Harrison).

Harrison made 140 completely different speeches in 30 days.

Benjamin Harrison was the first president to use electricity in the White House. After he got an electrical shock, his family often refused to touch the light switches and sometimes would go to bed with the lights on.

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Andrew Jackson was the first president born in a log cabin (South Carolina).

Andrew Jackson was the first president to ride in a train.

Andrew Jackson was the first American president to experience and survive an assassination attempt. Jackson was at the Capitol when an unemployed house painter fired a pistol at him. The pistol misfired. The would-be assassin drew a second pistol, which also misfired.

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Abraham Lincoln was a man of perseverance. Before Lincoln’s election as the 16th president of the United States he failed as: a business man – as a storekeeper, failed as a farmer – he despised this work, failed in his first attempt to obtain political office, he failed when he sought the office of speaker, he failed in his first attempt to go to Congress, he failed when he sought the appointment to the United States Land Office, he failed when he ran for the United States Senate and he failed when friends sought for him the nomination for the vice-presidency in 1856.

Abraham Lincoln was the first president to wear a beard and the tallest president at 6’ 4”.

Lincoln was the first president to die by assassination. On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C.

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The largest toy distributor in the world is McDonald’s.

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1. The record for the world’s worst drivers is a toss-up between two candidates: First, a 75-year-old man who received 10 traffic tickets, drove on the wrong side of the road four times, committed four hit-and-run offenses, an caused six accidents, all within 20 minutes on October 15, 1966. Second, a 62-year-old woman who failed her driving test 40 times before passing it in August, 1970 (by that time, she had spent over $700 in lessons, and could no longer afford to buy a car).
2. Lawsuits filed by California inmates cost the taxpayers more than $25 million in 1994
3. The suit was filed on behalf of Mr. Tansie's secretary, Betty Penrose, who accused God of negligence in His power over the weather when He allowed a lightning bolt to strike her home. Ms. Penrose won the case when the defendant failed to appear in court. Whether or not she collected has not been recorded.
4. Organized crime is estimated to account for 10% of the United States' national income.
5. The maximum security prison in St. Albans, Vermont, was responsible in 1996 for sending out public relations brochures enticing tourists to visit Vermont.
6. Airport security personnel find about six weapons a day searching passengers.
7. Sawney Beane, his wife, 8 sons, 6 daughters, and 32 grandchildren were a family of cannibals that lived in the caves near Galloway, Scotland in the early 17th Century. Although the total number is not known, it is believed they claimed over 50 victims per year. The entire family was taken by an army detachment to Edinburgh and executed, apparently without trial.

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   The Sargasso Sea is in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, between the West Indies and the Azores, covering some 3 million square kilometres (2 million square miles). Jules Verne wrote about it in "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea".

   The Sargasso Sea is encircled by the The Gulf Stream and the North Equatorial Current, causing the oval-shaped sea to move in a slow, clockwise drift. The water is exceptionally blue, with a high salt content.

   Its warm waters are exceptionally clear and blue, and filled with seaweed. Early navigators becalmed in the sea's still waters mistakenly believed their ships were tangled in the seaweed. They named the sea "sargaco", the Portuguese word for grape, after the seaweed's bulbous floats.

   The Sargasso Sea is also known as "the floating desert". Although about one-third of the Atlantic's plankton is produced here, the Sargassum lacks the nutrients to attract commercially valuable fish. But many small marine animals, including tiny crabs, shrimp and octopuses, live on and among the sargassum, the rootless weed. Deeply connected to the weeds, many would sink and perish if they lost their grip. The Sargasso Sea is 5km (3 miles) deep, thus the sargassum grow by budding.

   The Sargasso also is an international meeting place for eels. Drawn by unknown forces, the snakelike fish come from Europe, the Mediterranean and the United States to mate, spawn and die. From there, their larvae make the long journey back to continental waters.

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The practice of eating insects is called entomophagy
Most insects are edible. According to eatbug.com, there are 1,462 recorded species of edible insects. And they're quite nutritious. For instance, 100 grams of cricket contains only 121 calories, less than half of beef. A cricket contains only 5,5 grams of fat, compared to 21,2g of beef. Beef contains more protein (23,5g - a cricket 12.9g) but the 100g of cricket also contains 5,1g of carbohydrates, 75,8 mg calcium, 185,3 mg phosphorous, 9,5 mg iron, thiamin, riboflavin, and niacin.

Mid-men, the male versions of mid-wives, are called accouchers.

The working section of a piano is called the action. If you play piano, you get action!

The plastic things on the end of shoelaces are called aglets.

The distance that a place holder falls from a glass when it is lifted (you know, place holders sometimes get stuck to the bottom of a cold glass when you lift the glass) is called a bevemeter.

The study of creatures such as Bigfoot, the chupacabra, and the Loch Ness monster is called cryptozoology. Zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans coined the term to describe his investigations of animals unknown to science.

The apparatus used in alcohol distilleries for freeing the spirit from water is called the dephlegmator. Hey, they can call it Murgatroyd as long as it works!

One that speaks two languages - is bilingual - can be said to be diglot. Or a Miamian!

Ducks are never male. The males of the species are called drakes. And don't forget it!

Shoemakers are commonly called cobblers but correctly speaking a cobbler is a shoe repairmen. A shoemaker is a cordwainer.

The device at the intersection of two railroad tracks to permit the wheels and flanges on one track to cross or branch for the other is called a frog.

A specific length of thread or yarn according to the type of fiber is called a hank. For linen, a hank is 274 metres (300 yards); for cotton, it is 768 metres (840 yards).

The white part of your fingernail is called the lunula.

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These Oceanographic Facts

Ninety percent of all volcanic activity occurs in the oceans. In 1993, scientists located the largest known concentration of active volcanoes on the sea floor in the South Pacific. This area, the size of New York state, hosts 1,133 volcanic cones and sea mounts. Two or three could erupt at any moment.

The highest tides in the world are at the Bay of Fundy, which separates New Brunswick from Nova Scotia. At some times of the year the difference between high and low tide is 53 feet 6 inches, the equivalent of a three-story building.

The oceans cover 71 percent of the Earth’s surface and contain 97 percent of the Earth’s water. Less than 1 percent is fresh water, and 2-3 percent is contained in glaciers and ice caps.

Earth’s longest mountain range is the Mid-Ocean Ridge, which winds around the globe from the Arctic Ocean to the Atlantic, skirting Africa, Asia and Australia, and crossing the Pacific to the west coast of North America. It is four times longer than the Andes, Rockies, and Himalayas combined.

Canada has the longest coastline of any country, at 56,453 miles or around 15 percent of the world’s 372,384 miles of coastlines.

A slow cascade of water beneath the Denmark Strait sinks 2.2 miles, more than 3.5 times farther than Venezuela’s Angel Falls, the tallest waterfall on land.

El Ni–o, a periodic shift of warm waters from the western to eastern Pacific Ocean, has dramatic effects on climate worldwide. In 1982-1983, the most severe El Ni–o of the century created droughts, crop failures, fires, torrential rains, floods, landslides—total damages were estimated at more than $8 billion.

At the deepest point in the ocean the pressure is more than 8 tons per square inch, or the equivalent of one person trying to support 50 jumbo jets.

At 39 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature of almost all of the deep ocean is only a few degrees above freezing.

If mined, all the gold suspended in the world’s seawater would give each person on Earth 9 pounds.

In 1958, the United States Coast Guard icebreaker East Wind measured the world’s tallest known iceberg off western Greenland. At 550 feet it was only 5 feet 6 inches shorter than the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C.

Although Mount Everest, at 29,028 feet, is often called the tallest mountain on Earth, Mauna Kea, an inactive volcano on the island of Hawaii, is actually taller. Only 13,796 feet of Mauna Kea stands above sea level, yet it is 33,465 feet tall if measured from the ocean floor to its summit.

If the ocean’s total salt content were dried, it would cover the continents to a depth of 5 feet.

Undersea earthquakes and other disturbances cause tsunamis, or great waves. The largest recorded tsunami measured 210 feet above sea level when it reached Siberia’s Kamchatka Peninsula in 1737.

The Antarctic Ice Sheet is almost twice the size of the United States.

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Because steel expands when it gets hot, the Eiffel Tower is six inches taller in the summer than in the winter.

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Clouds fly higher during the day than the night.

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A shrimp’s heart is in its head.

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A chameleon’s tongue is twice the length of its body.

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The first football player on a Wheaties box was Walter Payton of Columbia.

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It is said that if a statue of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died in battle; if the horse has one front leg in the air, the person died as a result of wounds received in battle; if the horse has all four legs on the ground, like the Zizkov Monument, the person died of natural causes.

This huge edifice (built between 1929 and 1932 to commemorate the victory of General Jan Zizka and the Hussites in 1420 over the papal forces) stretches awkwardly along a long, narrow hill in Zizkov. The large statue of General Zizka fronting the building was erected in 1950. The monument became a symbol of the independent republic although it was used by the Nazis as an arsenal and later by the Communists as a mausoleum where the three Communist presidents are buried. It is also the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier where wreath-laying ceremonies take place.
                

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THERE WERE WOMEN ON US COINS!

Circulating Coins:

• Sacagewea on the dollar coin: 1999-Present
• Susan B. Anthony on the dollar coin: 1979-1981

Commemorative Coins:

• Queen Isabella of Spain on the Columbian Exposition Quarter Dollar: 1893
• Eunice Kennedy Shriver Silver Dollar: 1995
• Virginia Dare, with her mother Eleonor Dare, on the Roanoke Island, North Carolina Half Dollar: 1937

(Virginia Dare is mentioned by name on page 6 the Annual Report of the Director of the Mint for FY 1937. Other publications, such as R.S. Yeoman’s “Guide Book of United States Coins,” and Q. David Bowers’ “Commemorative Coins of the United States: A Complete Encyclopedia,” have identified her mother as Eleonor Dare.) Although it could be argued that the mother and daughter images on the Roanoke coin don’t fall into the classical “ Portrait ” category, all available evidence indicates that the image was meant to represent real people.

Therefore, four real women have been portrayed on U.S. coins in the history of the U.S. Mint.

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Rats multiply so quickly that in 18 months, two rats could have over a million descendants.

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Baby rattlesnakes are born without rattles.

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During World War II a cat called Oscar served on the German battleship Bismarck. When the Bismarck was torpedoed Oscar was rescued by a British sailor on board HMS Cossack. Five months later HMS Cossack was sunk but Oscar was rescued by HMS Ark Royal. Only 3 weeks later a German U-boat destroyed Ark Royal and Oscar was rescued again. The naval authorities then decided that Oscar had had enough and posted him on land. According to British naval records, Oscar died peacefully in 1955.

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In Africa, an estimated 680 of every 100,000 women who undergo an abortion die of some complications.

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Andrew Johnson had no formal education. His wife taught him reading, writing and math.

AND.....

Johnson was nearly impeached for removing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton during the turbulent Reconstruction Period; he was acquitted by one vote in the Senate.

AND.... 

Johnson was buried beneath a willow tree that he planted. His head rests on a copy of the Constitution.

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It is thought that more damage was done by the resulting fire after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake than by the earthquake itself.

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More than 80% of all adult smokers started in their teens.

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In 1894, the president of the Royal Society, Lord Kelvin, predicted that radio had no future. The first radio factory was opened five years later. He also predicted that heavier-than-air flying machines were impossible. Today, there are more than one billion radio sets in the world, tuned to more than 33 000 radio stations around the world. The Wright Brother's first flight covered a distance equal to only half the length of the wingspan of a Boeing 747.

In the 6th century BC Greek mathematician Pythagoras said that earth is round - but few agreed with him. Greek astronomer Aristarchos said in the 3rd century BC that earth revolves around the sun - but the idea was not accepted. In the 2nd century BC Greek astronomer Erastosthenes accurately measured the distance around the earth at about 40,000 km (24,860 miles) - but nobody believed him. In the 2nd century AD Greek astronomer Ptolemy stated that earth was the centre of the universe - most people believed him for the next 1,400 years.

In the early 20th century a world market for only 4 million automobiles was made because "the world would run out of chauffeurs." Shortly after the end of World War II (1945), the whole of Volkswagen, factory and patents, was offered free to Henry Ford II. He dismissed the Volkswagen Beetle as a bad design. Today, more than 70 million motorcars are produced every year. The Beetle became one of the best-selling vehicles of all time.

The telephone was not widely appreciated for the first 15 years because people did not see a use for it. In fact, in the British parliament it was mentioned there was no need for telephones because "we have enough messengers here." Western Union believed that it could never replace the telegraph. In 1876, an internal memo read: "This telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication." Even Mark Twain, upon being invited by Alexander Graham Bell to invest $5 000 in the new invention, could not see a future in the telephone.

Irish scientist, Dr. Dionysius Lardner (1793 - 1859) didn't believe that trains could contribute much in speedy transport. He wrote: "Rail travel at high speed is not possible, because passengers ' would die of asphyxia' [suffocation]." Today, trains reach speeds of 500 km/h.

In 1943, Thomas Watson, the chairman of IBM forecast a world market for "maybe only five computers." Years before IBM launched the personal computer in 1981, Xerox had already successfully designed and used PCs internally... but decided to concentrate on the production of photocopiers.

After the invention of the transistor in 1947, several US electronics companies rejected the idea of a portable radio. Apparently it was thought nobody would want to carry a radio around. When Bell put the transistor on the market in 1952 they had few takers apart from a small japanese start-up called Sony. They introduced the transistor radio in 1954.

In 1894, A.A. Michelson, who with E.W. Morley seven years earlier experimentally demonstrated the constancy of the speed of light, said that the future of science would consist of "adding a few decimal places to the results already obtained."

Sometimes a few decimal places make a massive difference. Library House explains that investment banks rely on computer models to direct trading activity; in August 2007, Goldman Sachs’ hedge funds and other quant funds were left exposed by a series of market swings, each of which their software predicted would occur only once every 100,000 years. Goldman Sachs required a $3 billion (€1.9 billion) bailout, with other banks joining the hand-out queue.

Perhaps the guy who got it wrong most was the commissioner of the US Office of Patents: in 1899, Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, assured President McKinley that "everything that can be invented has been invented."

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The vignette on the back of the $100 note is Independence Hall in Philadelphia. There are three people depicted in the engraving. Two (a man and a woman) are in front of the hall close to the building; the third person is a man pictured looking toward the building. There is no record that the man and woman are embracing.

The hands of the clock are set at approximately 4:10. Although the time is not readily identifiable to the naked eye, it may be verified if examined under twenty-fold magnification. There are no records explaining why that particular time was chosen

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The City of Myrtle Beach is in the center of the Grand Strand, a 60-mile crescent of beach on the South Carolina coast. In the last 25 years, Myrtle Beach has developed into the premier resort destination on the East Coast.

And Also...

South Carolina entered the Union on May 23, 1788 and became the 8th state.

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