When Muhammad Ali Met “Joe” On A Ninth-Floor Fire Escape (Cool Weird Awesome 462)
On this day in 1981, Muhammad Ali, a hero to millions inside the boxing ring, was a hero outside of it, convincing a man on a ninth-floor fire escape to come back inside the building and seek help.
Martin Luther King, Jr. Came Up With One Of His Most Famous Speeches In Under An Hour (Cool Weird Awesome 461)
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. could stir hearts and provoke minds through his writing and his speeches like few others in history. And so it’s even more amazing that his first speech as a public figure, at the outset of the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955, came together with almost no time to prepare it.
The First Top Hat Got Its Inventor Arrested (Cool Weird Awesome 460)
The (possibly apocryphal) story goes that on this day in 1797, haberdasher John Hetherington walked onto the streets of London wearing the first top hat, which caused so much hubbub that he was arrested and fined for disturbing the peace! Plus: in January 1974, MIT professor James Henry Williams, Jr. built a 35 pound yo-yo made of two bicycle wheels, and dropped it off the side of a 21-story campus building.
Sanford And Son Was Such A Hit, Its Star Briefly Walked Out And It Kept Going (Cool Weird Awesome 459)
It was today in 1972 that NBC first broadcast one of the most memorable sitcoms in TV history, “Sanford and Son." Here's a few facts about the show and its star, Redd Foxx. Plus: photographer Mike Mayou went out with a drone-mounted camera in Minnesota to catch the sunset but got something even more amazing.
Beethoven May Have Had Metronome Issues (Cool Weird Awesome 458)
Judging by metronome marks on his sheet music, Ludwig von Beethoven wanted his compositions played really, really fast. Or did he? A new data analysis suggests that the master composer and early metronome adopter may have just misread his device as he wrote down tempos. Plus: Lady Gaga has her own cookies!
The People Of 1921 Had A Good Feeling About 2021 (Cool Weird Awesome 457)
I certainly did not expect 2021 to be what it is, but what did people back in the day predict our world would be like now? Entrepreneur Magazine looked back at predictions from a hundred years ago, and some of them were surprisingly close to the mark. Plus: Robert "Buz" Chmielewski, who's had only limited feeling and movement in his hands and fingers for 30 years, is using special gear and the power of his mind to control prosthetics and serve himself dessert.