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Useless Facts 3
James B. Parsons became the first black man confirmed as a judgein a U.S. District Court on August 30, 1961.
Madam de Montespan, second wife of Louis XIV, once lost 4 million francs in a half-hour at the gambling table.
Michael Jordan makes more money from "Nike" annually than all of the Nike factory workers in Malaysia combined.
Jacqueline Kennedy's pillbox hat, made famous at her husband's inauguration in 1961, was designed by Halston.
Ferdinand Porsche, who later went on to build sports cars bearing his own name, designed the original 1936 Volkswagen
Esteemed actor Richard Harris was seen wearing an elastoplast on his neck when playing King Arthur in the film 'Camelot.'
Jacques-Yves Cousteau invented the aqualung, the self-contained device that supplies air under pressure for underwater divers.
Belgian driver Jenatzy was the first to reach a speed of over 100 km/h in his electrically powered car La Jamais Contente in 1899.
1913 Donald MacMillan, explorer, takes NECCO Wafers on his Arctic expedition, using them for nutrition and as rewards to Eskimo children.
James Ramsey invented a steam-driven motorboat in 1784.
He ran it on the Potomac River, and the event was witnessed by George Washington.
Bavarian immigrant Charles August Fey invented the first three-reel automatic payout slot machine, the Liberty Bell, in San Francisco in 1899.
In 1899, Charles H. Duell, commissioner of the U.S. Patent Office called for the abolition of his office. His reason: "Everything that can be invented has been invented
Who was the first US president to travel outside the US?
President Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909) became the first president to travel outside the US when he visited Panama.
Former senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona once shaved with peanut butter while on a camping trip. (For best results, avoid shaving with crunchy peanut butter.)
Edward G Robinson's character in 'The Last Gangster' gets sent to Alcatraz in 1927. This was probably not as bad a sentence as you might imagine since the prison wasn't opened there until 1934.
1914 Birth of Joe DiMaggio, former US baseball player. Called "Jolting Joe" and the "Yankee Clipper" by his fans, he was consistently ranked excellent all around player for the New York Yankees for 13 seasons.
What outrageous thing did Daniel Sickles do with the leg he had amputated during the Civil War? Daniel Sickles' leg was struck by a 12-pound cannonball at Gettysburg during the Civil War and had to be amputated. Not one to waste a limb, Sickles sent the leg to the new Army Medical Museum in Washington, DC, with a visiting card that read, "With the compliments of Major General D.E.S." For many years after, Sickles actually went to the museum on the anniversary of the amputation to visit his leg bone! And you can too: it's still on display at the National Museum of Health and Medicine at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, DC.
Pure electricity, when photographed, shows up as a brightly glowing liquid droplet flowing inside a tiny crystal.
When the grass looks greener on the other side of the fence, it may be that they take better care of it there.
~Cecil Selig
