Symbolism and the $1 Bill. Ww1. Archaeology News, Videos, Reviews and Gossip - io9. Einstein Archives Online. Biblical-Type Floods Are Real, and They're Absolutely Enormous. After teaching geology at the University of Washington for a decade, I had become embarrassed that I hadn’t yet seen the deep canyons where tremendous Ice Age floods scoured down into solid rock to sculpt the scablands.
So I decided to help lead a field trip for students to see the giant erosion scars on the local landforms. We drove across the Columbia River and continued eastward, dropping into Moses Coulee, a canyon with vertical walls of layered basalt. We gathered the students on a small rise and asked them how the canyon had formed. They immediately ruled out wind and glaciers. The valley was not U-shaped like a typical glacial valley, and none of us could imagine how wind might gouge a canyon out of hard basalt.
Hiking through eastern Washington canyons littered with exotic boulders is a standard field trip for beginning geologists. Why Aren’t There B Batteries? Reader Donna wrote in wondering why there are AA, AAA, C and D batteries, but no B. Well, there used to be, but they’re not really needed anymore. Around the time of World War I, American battery manufacturers, the War Industries Board, and a few government agencies got together to develop some nationally uniform specifications for the size of battery cells, their arrangement in batteries, their minimum performance criteria, and other standards.
In 1924, industry and government representatives met again to figure out a naming system for all those cells and batteries they had just standardized. They decided to base it around the alphabet, dubbing the smallest cells and single-cell batteries “A” and went from there to B, C and D. The Nazi Bomb That Looked Like Chocolate. Dan Lewis runs the wildly popular daily newsletter Now I Know (“Learn Something New Every Day, By Email”). To subscribe to his daily email, click here . The term “Death by Chocolate” usually refers to a dessert recipe — chocolate cake served with chocolate ice cream, chocolate syrup, sometimes with chocolate brownies or chocolate candies or chocolate shavings on top.
Chocolate, chocolate, and more chocolate. For most, Death by Chocolate seems like a wonderful idea. The Nazis agreed — but took the term more literally. In 2005, the British intelligence agency MI5 released a treasure trove of documents and photographs of camouflaged equipment used by Nazi saboteurs. The chocolate bars were more akin to hand grenades than the confections they purported to be. What, Exactly, is a “Radio Flyer”? To figure out the story behind one of America’s classic childhood toys, we have to start in Venice, Italy, the homeland Antonio Pasin left behind in 1914. The teenager and his cousin landed at Ellis Island the same year, intent to turn their woodworking skills into careers as cabinetmakers.
By 1917, Pasin was honing his skills on hand-carved wagons when he wasn’t working odd jobs to get start-up cash for his business. After a few years of pounding the pavement selling his wagons door-to-door, Pasin was able to make the company official. Rocky Road: Tradescant and Ashmole. Tradescant and Ashmole Top: Tradescant, Sr. portrait from Cabinets of Curiosities by Patrick Mauries Bottom: Ashmole portrait from Ingenious Pursuits: Building the Scientific Revolution by Lisa Jardine From Mr.
Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder by Lawrence Weschler. 5 Crazy Ways People Amused Themselves Before Television. LBJ: The President Who Marked His Territory. Lyndon Baines Johnson wanted to be remembered as the greatest president who ever lived. With that grand ambition in mind (and an ego to match), he launched such sweeping social programs as Medicare, Medicaid, Head Start, public radio, public television, and food stamps.
Regardless, Johnson will probably be best remembered for his blinding arrogance, and what many would point to as the result of it—the Vietnam War. But here, we're choosing to remember Johnson not by the many political wheels he set into motion, but by the stuff he kept by his side—and close to his heart. Petra: Lost City of Stone. Deep within the deserts of Jordan lies the ancient city of Petra.
Through a narrow gorge it emerges into view, revealing awe-inspiring monuments cut into the surrounding cliffs. What is this astonishing city? Can you identify the image in the world's oldest photograph? The Easter Island “Heads” Have Bodies. Maybe this isn't a newsflash to anyone but me, but, um, the Moai "heads" on Easter Island have bodies.
Because some of the statues are set deep into the ground, and because the heads on the statues are disproportionately large, many people (myself included) tend to think of them as just big heads. But the bodies (generally not including legs, though there is at least one kneeling statue) are there -- in many cases, underground. What's even more interesting -- there are petroglyphs (rock markings) that have been preserved below the soil level, where they have been protected from erosion. The Best-Selling Greeting Card of All Time. 9 2ShareNew Since 1916, Hallmark has churned out billions of greeting cards, but no single card has had the staying power of the legendary Pansy Card—the king of the racks.
Somehow the notoriously bland card was a rock star from the get-go. What Do the Olympic Rings Mean? In 1894, Pierre de Frédy, Baron de Coubertin—a French aristocrat and intellectual who had previously attempted to incorporate more physical education in schools—convened a congress in Paris with the goal of reviving the ancient Olympic Games (an idea Coubertin first introduced at a USFSA meeting in 1889). The statues of Easter Island could have "walked" into place. There've been various mechanisms proposed for moving the moai.
Another suggested technique involved sliding them on a layer of small round rocks, and then raising them upright by piling small rocks underneath them, lifting them a little, piling more rocks under them, and so on. This always seemed plausible to me as - having hiked across Easter Island - I can confirm that the island has an abundant supply of small round rocks. Moreover, they roll extremely well, particularly if you're unlucky enough to put your foot down on them. (insert unhappy face) Constructing Stonehenge was the project that unified Britain. 60 years of royalty, discovery and global events. Our world today is almost unrecognizable compared with 1952, the year Queen Elizabeth ascended to the UK throne.
Since then, man has taken his first steps on the moon and the internet has connected the world on a previously unimaginable scale. The world has also been shaken by atrocities like the September 11 attacks in New York City. CNN's interactive crossover timeline lets you compare technological discoveries with key events in world affairs and memorable moments from Queen Elizabeth II's 60 years on the throne. Casey at the Bat by Ernest Thayer on Baseball Almanac. Elva Zona Heaster: The Ghost Who Helped Solve Her Own Murder. Image credit: VisitWV.com One January afternoon in 1897, Erasmus (aka Edward) Shue, a blacksmith, sent his neighbor’s young boy to see if Elva, Shue's wife of three months, needed anything from the market.
When the neighbor boy walked through the front door of the Shues’ rural Greenbrier County, West Virginia, log house, he found Elva’s lifeless body at the foot of the stairs. The boy stood for a moment looking at the woman, not knowing what to make of the scene. The Founder of Mother’s Day Later Fought to Have It Abolished. Years after she founded Mother’s Day, Anna Jarvis was dining at the Tea Room at Wanamaker’s department store in Philadelphia.
She saw they were offering a “Mother’s Day Salad.” The Time Groucho Marx Did the Charleston on Hitler’s Grave. Morbid Road Trip: The Scattered Artifacts of Lincoln’s Assassination. Almost every item even remotely connected to Lincoln’s assassination, death, and funeral later found its way into some special collection.
Many wound up in the hands of museums, historical societies, or the government, and are available for public viewing. Many more in private collections occasionally get loaned out for display. If I ever convince my girlfriend to go on an Assassination Vacation-esque Lincoln road trip, here’s what’s on my must-see list: Why Some Civil War Soldiers Glowed in the Dark. FUSAG: The Ghost Army of World War II. Whatever happened to the iceberg that sank the Titanic? The Space Craze That Gripped Russia Nearly 100 Years Ago. Newspapers proclaimed that hundreds of starships would soon venture out into the cosmos.
People dreamed of moon colonies that were just a few years away. Ordinary citizens organized competitions to build rockets to reach the edge of space. Welcome to Russia in the 1920s. America’s fascination with space grew up in the 1950s and ’60s. Why were 10 dead bodies found in Benjamin Franklin's basement?