News, Entertainment, Enlightenment
The first sitting president to attend a Major League Baseball game was Benjamin Harrison who on June 6, 1892 saw the Cincinnati Reds beat the first version of the Washington Senators 7-4.
Darby Free Library in Darby Borough, Pa. is the oldest library in the United States in continuous service. It was started in 1743.
Portugal — at 82.75 percent — has the highest maximum income tax rate in the world.
Tea refers to what is brewed from camellia sinensis. If you want to call it tea but it’s brewed from something else the adjective herbal is needed.
Those cooking up the United States naval hull classification system were trying to be sensible. After all, B means battleship, C means cruiser, D means destroyer and S means submarine.
So why are aircraft carriers labeled CV?
When the mighty ships were first coming into use they were considered cruisers hence the C and things would be flown off it hence the V.
OK, the V. It’s based on the French word voler which means to fly. Why French? We don’t know. Guess it made sense at the time.
The greatest length of active service as a general in the U.S. Army was Winfield Scott who held the rank from 1814 to 1861, when he resigned seven months after the start of the Civil War because President Lincoln stopped listening to him. General Grant arguably did, however, a few years later. Grant’s victorious strategy was quite similar to the “Anaconda Plan” of strangling the South initially promoted by Scott.
Yes Anthony, there have been some planes with single-bladed propellers.
On this date (April 9) in 1731, the good ship HMS Rebecca commanded by Robert Jenkins was stopped by the Spanish in the West Indies for suspicion of smuggling. The Spanish commander became upset with Jenkins and sliced of his ear. It was the news of the day. Benjamin Franklin wrote about it in the Pennsylvania Gazette. It led to the War of Jenkins Ear between Britain and Spain. Georgia invaded Florida and besieged St. Augustine. Then Florida invaded George but was pushed back. In the end, Spain managed to stop British smuggling.
The oldest maker of firearms is Beretta. The Italian company started in 1526.
It’s a small world. Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Largo was sold to Donald Trump by Fred Korth who was the step-grandfather of Democrat superstar Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke. Korth was the co-executor of the estate of Marjorie Merriweather Post, who was his lover and who built Mar-a-Largo. Korth married Charlotte Brooks Williams, O’Rourke’s grandmother, in 1980 after Ms. Post’s death.
Korth was a rich Texas banker who served as John F. Kennedy’s Secretary of the Navy until leaving the post on Nov. 1, 1963 under a cloud.
Put this in a small world category too: Korth handled the divorce of Edwin A. Edahl in 1948 from Marguerite Frances Claverie Ekdahl. She’s also known as Marguerite Oswald. She was Lee Harvey’s mom.