Strange But True: Medicinal Whiskey
By Lucie Winborne
Read a week's worth of The New York Times and you'll have absorbed more information than the average 17th-century citizen would have encountered in their lifetime.
A 1972 plane crash that claimed the lives of 101 people occurred because the crew was distracted by a burned-out landing gear indicator light and failed to notice that the autopilot had inadvertently been disconnected.
California was named for a fictional island in a 16th-century romance novel.
Researchers testing insect repellents used Victoria Secret's Bombshell perfume as a standard and accidentally discovered that it repels mosquitoes better than many repellents on the market.
In 19th-century Maryland, it was illegal to sell mineral water on a Sunday.
People's body temperature drops when they watch videos of other folks putting their hands into cold water.
Onychophagia is the technical term for biting your nails.
A man who tattooed the word "Netflix" on his body and then tweeted a picture of the ink to the company was rewarded with a year's worth of free service.
In Wisconsin, the most frequently googled "how to spell" word is Wisconsin.
When Prohibition started, alcohol could only be bought for medicinal and religious purposes, from a pharmacy or a doctor. "Medicinal whiskey" was prescribed for just about anything and used to treat conditions such as toothaches and the flu. With a prescription, a patient could legally purchase up to 1 pint of hard liquor every 10 days.
In medieval times, the word "abracadabra" was written out in the shape of a triangle and worn around the neck in an amulet to prevent deadly diseases.
It takes somewhere between 144 and 411 licks to reach the center of a Tootsie Pop.
Thought for the Day: "The purpose of life is a life of purpose." -- Robert Byrne
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