Interesting stuff I now know thanks to Wikipedia (Vol. 3)

As with the first two entries, the premise of this is simple.  I just used the Random Article link on Wikipedia and saw if anything good came up.  (a lot of it is quite useless)

  • The town of Britton, Michigan is named after storekeeper John Britton, who in 1888 paid $500 to rename the town of Balch after himself.
  • There is a variant of Scrabble called Clabbers, whose rules are the same except for one: The letters used must form anagrams of acceptable words.
  • The Grammy Award for Best Gospel Vocal Performance, Female was only given out from 1984 through 1990.  Amy Grant won it four times.
  • The 1968 Cannes Film Festival ended early, without awarding any prizes, due to a French general strike in May.
  • I can’t believe I didn’t know this, but Adolf Hitler had a sister, Paula Hitler.  She was the only one of his full siblings to survive into adulthood.
  • With approximately 23 million adherents, Sikhism is the fifth-largest organized religion in the world.
  • As a result of signing the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty, Egypt’s membership in the Arab League was suspended from 1979 until 1989.
  • Columbia, Tennessee is the self-proclaimed “Mule capital of the world” and celebrates with Mule Day, a large celebration held annually every April.
  • In 1861, competitive walker Edward Payson Weston walked from Boston to Washington, D.C. in 10 days, 10 hours to attend the inauguration of President Lincoln.  He did so after losing a bet.




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  • Thom

    in July 22nd, 2008 @ 12:04

    Wow, even back in the 1860s people were just slapping the word “competitive” in front of all sorts of stupid things.


  • clever-title

    in July 23rd, 2008 @ 12:23

    I can one-up your Hitler fact. Hitler’s nephew (William Patrick) fought as a US seaman in WWII, and then lived out his life on Long Island under an assumed name. His sons (one of them named Adolf) made a pact to not have children, so the bloodline dies with them:
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/1382115/Getting-to-know-the-Hitlers.html

    but I didn’t learn this from wikipedia, so it doesn’t count.


  • Chris

    in July 23rd, 2008 @ 12:29

    Man, all this Hitler talk gives me a hankering to watch the History Channel. If only they’d stop showing that craptastic Ice Road Truckers show.


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