John Adams And Ben Franklin Shared A Room Once And Spent The Night Arguing About The Window
Today in 1735, the birthday of John Adams, the only president who ever spent a night bickering in bed with Benjamin Franklin.
In The Early 20th Century, Some Americans Thought Tipping Was Horrible (Cool Weird Awesome 1292)
When tipping first came to the US, it had lots of opponents, sometimes for opposing reasons.
The Washington Monument That Was Built Before The Washington Monument (Cool Weird Awesome 1268)
Today in 1827, the people of Boonsboro, Maryland marked Independence Day by trying to build a stone monument to George Washington in a single day.
![Riveting team working on the cockpit shell of a B-25 [i.e. C-47] bomber at the plant of North American Aviation, Inc., Inglewood [i.e. Douglas Aircraft Company, Long Beach], Calif. Photo by Alfred T. Palmer via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division/Wikicommons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosie_the_Riveter#/media/File:Riveting_team2.jpg](https://www.bradycarlson.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/20240529riveter-80x32.jpg)
There Was More Than One “Real” Rosie the Riveter (Cool Weird Awesome 1247)
Today in 1943, Norman Rockwell's painting "Rosie the Riveter" was on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post. But that's not the image that we think of today as Rosie, and just as there were multiple depictions of the character, there were multiple real-life inspirations for those depictions.
The “Hairy Eagle” Is A Decoration Made Partly With Abraham Lincoln’s Hair
It's Abe Lincoln's birthday, and if you want to see a small bit of the man himself, you could try heading to Syracuse, New York, where there’s a bit of Abe Lincoln’s hair in a very unusual decoration known as the Hairy Eagle.
The US Rationed Shoes During World War II, So People Made Footwear Out Of Old Firehoses
Today in 1943, the US announced it would start rationing shoes to save rubber and leather for the troops in World War II. People on the home front found ways to make shoes out of alternative materials.
During Prohibition, Grape Growers Sold “Wine Bricks” To Thirsty Customers (Cool Weird Awesome 1172)
This week in 1920, a federal law enforcing the Constitution's Prohibition Amendment took effect. But there were loopholes, and one of the most clever way to use those loopholes was through something known as the "grape brick" or "wine brick."
When Martin Luther King Jr. Won The Nobel Peace Prize, Atlanta Held A Historic Dinner In His Honor (Cool Weird Awesome 1170)
Dr. King's home city gave him a warm welcome after he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, though putting that warm welcome together got complicated.
Teddy Roosevelt Tried To Change How We Spell Words (Cool Weird Awesome 1145)
Today in 1906 a vote in Congress put an end to one of President Theodore Roosevelt’s top priorities: simplifying the way we spell words. Or, as he would have preferred, spel wurds.
Oklahoma’s Panhandle Was Once Known As “No Man’s Land” (Cool Weird Awesome 1127)
Today in 1907 Oklahoma became the 46th state in the Union. Oklahoma's panhandle has a complicated history that includes a time when it was known as “No Man’s Land.”