Mr. Write's Page

More useless facts for inquiring minds.

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— In 2011, pro golfer Kevin Na set a PGA record, but not in a good way. On the 9th hole at the Valero Texas Open, he shot a 16, the most strokes on a par-4 hole in PGA history. He took a full 20 minutes to do it.

— The plastic caps on the ends of your shoelaces are called aglets.

— Of the 32 football teams in the NFL, all have team mascots except the Jets, Giants, Raiders, Redskins, and Packers.

— During World War I, England’s Navy Minister Winston Churchill pushed for the creation of a “land boat” that could break through enemy lines and traverse difficult terrain. The result in 1915 was Little Willie, the world’s first military tank. Little Willie carried a crew of six, but its top speed was only two miles per hour. It overheated easily and couldn’t cross trenches.

In 1916, England unveiled an improved version, the Mark I (Big Willie), which also underwhelmed. However, by 1917, England had improved the design markedly, and 400 Mark IVs were rolled out. By the end of the war, the Mark IVs had captured 8,000 enemy troops and 100 artillery pieces.

— The Catholic religion espouses Seven Heavenly Virtues and Seven Deadly Sins. The virtues are faith, hope, charity, prudence, justice, courage, and temperance. The sins are pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth. Hard to argue with that.

— Wisconsin calls itself “America’s Dairyland,” but California passed it decades ago as the country’s leading producer of dairy products. Wisconsin still makes more cheese, so that’s something.

— In December 1976, the British rock band Pink Floyd arranged for the construction of a 40-foot-long helium-filled balloon in the shape of a pig to use on the cover of its album Animals.

Inclement weather caused the balloon to break free of its moorings, and the pig drifted over Heathrow Airport, resulting in panic and cancelled flights. Eventually, an angry farmer reported that the balloon came down in Kent, frightening his cows.

— The average five-year-old asks about 400 questions per day.

— In Hawaii, you are prohibited by law from carrying coins in your ear.

— Bohemia, a cultural region in central Europe, has been bounced around like a football for centuries. It began in the 800s as part of the Great Moravian Empire; split off as the Duchy of Bohemia; became part of the Holy Roman Empire; part of the Habsburg Monarchy; part of the Austrian Empire; part of Czechoslovakia; part of Nazi Germany; part of the Second Czechoslovak Republic; part of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; and today, part of the Czech Republic. Stay tuned.

— Both Rogaine and Viagra were first developed as treatments for high blood pressure.

— While he was President, Ulysses Grant was ticketed several times for driving his horse-drawn carriage too fast around Washington. On one occasion, he was stopped for speeding down M Street and taken to court. He paid a $5 fine and was required to walk back to the White House.