Things I Learned in February 2025
Serendipitous Factoids 13: Monsters, Emus, and a Booking a Trip to the Moon
Another rousing welcome to all the new subscribers to Paws, Claws, and Landing Gear! I’m still unsure where you all came from but I’m really, really glad you’re here!
For most of you this is your first issue of Serendipitous Factoids. To give you some background on this monthly feature:
Growing up I used to read a weekly column called, "Strictly Personal" by Sydney J. Harris. I was especially fond of his recurring ''Things I Learned En Route to Looking Up Other Things.'' The tidbits he put into those columns filled my young head, or as my sister Diane called it, my "trivial brain."
I recalled Harris' work one day when I found myself down the rabbit hole of the interwebs, finding interesting fact after interesting fact, forgetting why I was surfing to start with. I realized that I should emulate Harris and start keeping track of these things. So I did.
For about 18 months or so I was making Facebook posts about interesting things I learned in the previous month, and called them “What I Learned in [Month][Year].” In my previous blog, I had what I called “Serendipitous Factoids.” With this newsletter, I’ve combined the two.
And now, without further ado, the Goblins of Minutiae that live in my head gathering up all this trivia present Serendipitous Factoids 13.
Trivial things I learned while looking for something else…
Cookie Monster’s first name is Sid. He is Sidney Monster.
The 1932 the Australian Army went to war against hordes of emus that were ravaging wheat crops. It was called the Emu War. The emus won.
The famous “Keep Calm and Carry On” poster from WWII Britain was never released during World War II. They were created a last resort morale-boosting poster but weren’t needed. They became famous after the war.
Speaking of posters, the bestselling poster ever, having sold 12 million copies, is the 1976 Farrah Fawcett red swimsuit poster. It was so popular that an original poster print and the red swimsuit are in the Smithsonian.
Hiram Revels, born free in North Carolina, was the first African-American to serve in either chamber of the US Congress. The second, Blanche Bruce, was the first African-American to serve a full term and had been born into slavery.
The heaviest building in the world is the Palace of the Parliament in Bucharest, Romania. It weighs 9 billion pounds (4.1 billion kilograms) and is so heavy that it is sinking several millimeters per year.
The first company to create a wait list for travel to the Moon was Pan American Airlines. Pan Am created the list in 1964, estimating that commercial travel to the Earth’s natural satellite would start in 2000. By 1971, 93,000 people had joined the list. Sadly, only 12 people have walked on the moon and Pan Am went out of business in 1991.
That’s it for now. The Goblins of Minutiae are signing off for this month! They’ll be back to enlighten you in bite-sized bits in March!
2W:LYK