Fastfacts


Arizona Daily Wildcat
Monday, March 22, 2004

Things you always never wanted to know

  • Thirty thousand monkeys were used in a massive three-year effort to classify types of polio.

  • On June 12, 1775, the British offered to pardon all colonists who would lay down their arms. There would be only two exceptions to the amnesty: Samuel Adams and John Hancock, if captured, were to be hanged.

  • Demosthenes, one of the greatest orators of all time, stuttered but stubbornly trained himself out of it by putting pebbles in his mouth while speaking.

  • Though Columbus is generally thought to be from Genoa, he never wrote in any form of Italian, not even Genoese; he wrote only in Spanish.

  • In early America, death was often the most public and most dignified event in an individual's life. It was considered important to "die well," surrounded by friends, neighbors and relatives.

  • So dense is the spruce tree forest canopy of the vast Canadian Lakes District that winter snow stays on top of the trees, like a blanket, and the forest floor stays bare.

  • Duckweed, or marimo, is a now-you-see-it-now-you-don't weed found in Lake Akan at Daisetsuzan National Park in Japan. The weed forms in a ball at the bottom of the lake, rises to rid itself of oxygen, then sinks and rises again in a perpetual cycle. "Marimo spotting" is a sport there.

  • From 1836 to 1896, the Red Flag Act in England required that any self-propelled vehicle be preceded by a man carrying a red flag by day and a red lantern by night. In effect, that limited speed to 4 mph and slowed development of all self-propelled vehicles, including automobiles.

  • When Columbus returned to Europe, he brought with him not only news of a new world, but a new plague as well. His sailors carried a virulent, deadly variety of syphilis that caused the Barcelona Epidemic of 1493, and proceeded to ravage Europe.

  • The chief drafter of the U.S. Constitution and twice president of the United States was a lightweight on the scales. James Madison weighed in at only 100 pounds. He was also the shortest president, at 5 feet 4 inches.